


A Secret Power

by Distractivate



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Also Queer Feelings, And the 2-ish Years In Between, Anyway did I mention Roommates?, Brooklyn, Coming Out, Developing Relationship, Episode: s04e07 The Barbecue, Episode: s06e14 Happy Ending, F/F, Friendship, Happy Ending, Introspection, Introspection About Sex Toys (not only in that order), Making friends with exes, Mostly good feelings, Moving On, Mutual Pining, New York City, POV Rachel, Queer Themes, Rachel Deserves One Too, Roommates, Sex Toys, Sexual Content, lots of feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:14:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 28,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26456251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Distractivate/pseuds/Distractivate
Summary: After her talk with Patrick in Schitt's Creek, Rachel goes on her own journey in search of love, happiness, and identity. Along the way, she and Patrick share parts of their new lives with each other as they try to rebuild their friendship.
Relationships: A tease of Alexis Rose/Rachel, Patrick Brewer & Rachel, Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Rachel (Schitt's Creek)/Original Character(s)
Comments: 105
Kudos: 118
Collections: Elevate! A Schitt's Creek Femslash Exchange





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yourbuttervoicedbeau (kiwiana)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiwiana/gifts).



> Title from [Writer In the Dark](https://youtu.be/vJk6cpNCnNM) written by Lorde and Jack Antonoff.
> 
>  **Content Note:** This story includes complicated feelings about past sexual experiences and very minor references to grieving a deceased parent. The death occurs well before the beginning of this story and is not a central feature, but I didn’t want the mention of it to sneak up on you. There are no causes or illnesses mentioned.

“SO. YOU probably have some questions,” Patrick finishes, toeing at the wood chips below his feet. They took a walk to the park and they’ve been sitting on the swings for almost an hour as Patrick filled her in on the last six months. She can feel the weight and warmth of him next to her, but his head isn’t here. His heart isn’t here. It’s back in the motel room with—with his boyfriend. With David.

“Why?” That’s probably not the kind of question he expected, but it bursts out of her mouth before she can stop it. 

“Why?” Patrick’s brow furrows and she aches to smooth the line between his eyes like she used to. “I—I’m not sure what you’re asking, Rachel.”

Why did you date me? Why are you gay? Why didn’t you know? Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you even text me back? Why didn’t _I_ know? Why didn’t you tell him about me? _Why?_

“When did you know?” she tries instead.

“I didn’t know for sure until I moved here,” Patrick says, staring at the spiral slide across the playground like the words she needs to hear will pop out of the bottom any minute. The sun beams harshly through the row of pines on the edge of the park, threatening to turn over duties to the night.

“Does anyone else from home know?” 

Finally, he looks at her. Really looks at her. It’s the first time she doesn’t feel like she’s looking at a stranger. He shakes his head tightly with a spark of fear in his eyes. 

“Hey,” she soothes. “It’s yours to tell.” She tries not to worry, yet, about what she’s going to do with this swirl of hurt and embarrassment and confusion inside her, knowing she can’t tell anyone back home how it got there.

“Thanks,” he breathes. 

“I’m sorry I came. I just thought...” The tears flash hot and she blinks them away as quickly as she can.

“I know. I should have... I don’t know.”

“You should have.” 

“Yeah.”

She wants to yell and scream and cry at his stupid, gorgeous face and pummel his stupid, strong shoulders and squeeze his stupid, warm body in her arms one more time. Instead she twists the swing so she’s facing him and smiles bravely. 

“So how did you know? Like, for sure?”

“Uh,” he stalls, his stupid, round cheeks going pink. “I guess I just stopped being sure I was straight. And then pretty soon I had answers to a lot of questions I’d never been able to answer before.”

“Okay.” She scratches the underside of her calf with the edge of her sandal. 

Patrick reaches out a stupid, broad hand but doesn’t quite touch her. “Rach...” 

She just shrugs. “You love him. I can tell.”

Patrick startles and blinks his stupid, loud eyes. “Probably, yeah.”

 _Probably._ She wants to thump him on his stupid, thick head. These answers aren’t helping. Rachel pushes back against the ground and lifts her legs, swinging upward. “Bet I can go higher than you,” she calls.

“Not a chance, Covington.”

They never do get their swings in sync enough to tell who is going highest, but it’s fun anyway. For a little while it’s fun. 

The fun has faded with the sunlight as they walk back to the motel where his car is still parked. She watches as he gets into the driver’s seat and stares at the door where David disappeared, and then that’s it. That’s the limit of understanding and compassion and okay-ness she can project. She stumbles into her room and sags into the bed and lets everything loose. 

She must fall asleep because she awakens to a rat-tat-tat on the door at a quarter to ten. 

“Who is it?” Her voice is hoarse from crying. A brief inspection in the mirror reveals that her hair is everywhere and her face is puffy.

“Oh, hey, it’s just me. Alexis.” 

Rachel tugs a brush through her hair on the way to the door and pulls it open. 

“Hey.” She winces as her voice cracks.

“Hey,” Alexis says, shimmying her way into the room. “I know it’s been a bit of a day, so I thought I’d come and see how _you_ were doing.”

“Oh,” Rachel says. “That’s nice of you. I’m doing okay.”

“Mm, not sure I believe you, based on the before and after.” Alexis waves her hand at Rachel to indicate the general disaster area. “You look like Kloe Kardashian when they canceled Kocktails with Khloe. We took her to the Seychelles for spa treatments and she _still_ had bags under her eyes.” 

“I just woke up,” Rachel tries feebly. 

“I remember you saying that you were disappointed about sleeping alone in some roadside motel and I can’t do anything about the motel—believe me, I’ve tried—but I _can_ do something about the alone. Also, my brother has locked himself in our room with my phone so there’s _literally_ nowhere else for me to go.”

Rachel doesn’t point out that there are _literally_ any number of places she could go, since they’re in a building that specializes in renting beds for the night. It’s nice to have the company. Alexis is fun and funny and the kind of gorgeous that begs to be seen up close. Alexis is also the only person in her life right now who knows Patrick here. 

“Well, make yourself at home I guess.”

“Ooh, you have champagne?” Alexis asks, making a beeline for the ice bucket.

“Yeah. I brought it in case—You know what? Pour me a glass.”

“Way ahead of you, babe,” she says, and begins untwisting the wire. 

Alexis jumps when the cork pops, making Rachel laugh, and fills two mugs for them. They lean back against the headboard and Alexis fills her in on the saga of Ted before today’s bagel text, this time with the added detail of his girlfriend Heather whose cat needs regular washing. It’s kind of wild but it’s nothing compared to the stories she tells in between about her escapades before moving here. As she listens to Alexis, she wonders about David. Is he like this too? Full of trauma recast as adventure?

When the champagne is gone they lay back on the bed, giggling about things that won’t be as funny in the morning. Suddenly, Alexis turns very serious and cups Rachel’s chin in her hand. 

“I’m sorry things didn’t work out with that lil button-face. Or maybe I’m not sorry. I’m sorry for _you_ , but still hoping it works out for my brother. Sorry, this is, like, really complicated.”

Rachel giggles. “I think I know what you mean.” 

“Okay but I need to know something,” Alexis says, inching closer. Her eyes are a striking, dimensional green, like the leaves of a jade. For a minute they just stare at each other, her nails sharp against Rachel’s cheeks. She notices and lets go. “Will you promise not to tell anyone that I’m actually a little bit worried about David?”

Rachel smiles again but Alexis stays very serious, so she does her best to match her. “What makes you worried?”

“I don’t know!” she says. “Worrying is usually David’s thing. I’m normally, like, super chill.”

Rachel laughs again—she can’t help it. She murmurs, “Sorry,” when Alexis glares. 

“I am!”

“I’m sure. It’s just that I’ve spent more energy on your boy problem than my own today.”

“Yes, because I wanted to make sure I was handling the whole _situation_ in a way that was super chill.” If they weren’t so close, Rachel probably would miss the calculating narrowing of her eye. “Anyway Ted’s text was an accident so it doesn’t matter.”

“Okay,” Rachel says. 

“I’m glad you invited me over,” Alexis says, and Rachel is too buzzed and too comfortable to remind her she invited herself. When Alexis looks at her again, her eyes are wide and serious. “Part of me feels like we were destined to meet today.” 

Rachel smiles. It feels... something, to have Alexis look into her eyes and say a thing like that, even though, “You said the same thing earlier.”

“I know. It’s just _this_ time, I meant it.”

Rachel’s smile pulls wider. “Boys are stupid huh?”

“They so are.”

“I don’t even know why Patrick likes them.”

Alexis laughs again and rolls toward her, the collar of her dress stretching to reveal a sharp collarbone. Rachel gets kind of stuck looking at it. “Sometimes they’re sweet.”

“I think Ted is missing out,” Rachel says, and then all she can think about is what he’s missing out on, about Alexis’s lips, and how fearless she is, and how those two things together could add up to a lot. She watches her mouth curve in a smile and when she looks back up, Alexis is watching her. 

“This is really nice,” she whispers, and then with a yawn she burrows into Rachel’s shoulder, her breath hot against her neck.

“I’m glad I didn’t have to spend tonight alone.”

Alexis is quiet for a long time, and then she reaches for the covers and pulls them over both of them. “Me too.”

Rachel can feel the buzz wearing off. She should turn out the lamp, put on her pajamas, get them some water for the morning, arrange them in sleeping positions befitting the strangers they are. She doesn’t do any of that. She just closes her eyes and slows her breathing until she’s asleep, too. 

ALEXIS’S HANDS are deceptively strong. Each slender finger wraps around her wrist, and she closes her eyes against the whisper-quiet stroke of her thumb along the vein, the soft pressure of each fingertip against her skin, the faintest edge of one of her blush pink nails.

“I can feel your pulse.” Her lips brush against it below her thumb as she says it, an almost-kiss. 

“Mmm,” Rachel says, trying to be encouraging. A loose strand of hair falls from her hasty knot and pools in the hollow of Alexis’s collarbone. 

“That tickles.” Alexis’s mouth curves into a slow smile. She lets go of Rachel’s wrist to tuck it back behind her ear, and their eyes catch, Alexis’s a pale, translucent green. There’s a flicker of déjà vu in her slow blink, the soft spread of lashes on her cheeks. “Will you kiss me?” 

It’s so tentative, so soft, like she’s not sure Rachel will say yes even though they’re lying here with their softest skin exposed, pressed and sweaty against each other. Rachel takes her narrow face between her hands, caresses her soft cheeks under her thumbs. And then she does.

The kiss is broken by the night, a jarring return to consciousness, breaths tearing wet and heavy from her chest. 

Rachel sits and blinks at the small motel room, her body aching to fulfill the promises of her dream. Alexis is passed out next to her, one leg sticking out from the blankets, her dress riding up to mid-thigh. She’s still lost in the bone-deep sleep of a person who doesn’t worry about what’s coming tomorrow. 

The room is stuffy and close; Rachel’s back is damp with sweat. She lies back on the bed, the frame creaking in protest, and rubs her eyes, her neck. If Alexis weren’t here she’d keep working lower.

Instead she rolls over and tucks her legs to her chest as she checks her phone, the display glowing bright with the time. Four a.m. There’s no way she’s going to fall back to sleep.

THE SUN is bright and mocking the whole way home. She rolls down the windows to sing along with Lorde but she keeps dropping the words, like her brain never really reset from the day before. 

She’s happy for Patrick. She is. But she’s also so very, very sad. Since the first time they got back together, she’s never really had to accept that it’s over. Every breakup after that, even when she was furious with him, there was hope they would work it out. Now that they for sure won’t, she’s just... sad. Sad about the energy they both put in. Sad about the future she grew attached to, organized her life around, that will never happen. Sad that she can’t just be happy for him, can’t just be okay with it, and nothing else.

And she’s jealous. She’s ashamed of it, but she’s so fucking jealous. After the years they spent trying to find themselves in each other, her heart is broken and he’s in love. And not just with his boyfriend, but with himself, the person he became there. How much time did they waste? How much time is she still wasting? 

Then there’s Alexis and the wonderful, warm, slightly baffling diversion of her own boy problem. Rachel thinks about the way Alexis looked at her when they woke up, that split second before she realized where she was and who she was with. That “Oh hey” and unabashed smile, like it’s not the first or the fiftieth time she’s woken up with someone she barely knows. The way she ducked out to get cinnamon buns and coffee while Rachel showered and then ate them with her, her fingers picking them apart into bite-size pieces, her eyes closing as she savored the dough in her mouth. The way she took Rachel’s phone and added her number so they could, like, maybe keep in touch or something. 

“You never know when you’ll need a friend,” she’d said with a wink. And the wink was... flirty. Which is probably just Alexis but. Rachel has never been undone by flirting before.

It’s not that she’s never spent the night curled up with a woman. She had close friends in university. They would often pass out in each other’s beds after a party, or just fall asleep watching bad reality TV. Sometimes she even wondered what it might be like to kiss them. Sometimes they snuck into her dreams, mixed up with so many other weird and discordant details that she never thought much of it. But that was normal, right? Normal curiosity. Normal brains being weird. Some girls seem to like being noticed so... it’s normal to notice them.

Is it normal to notice them?

What is definitely, probably, normal is to be a little thrown when you find out your boyfriend of fifteen years is gay. It’s normal to feel like maybe nothing is what it seemed. And in the midst of that, it’s normal to be a little confused about everything she thought she knew about herself. Just the result of a long, weird, hard day. The solution is to get home, and everything will be right again.

* * *

IT TAKES her four months to sort out that things are never going to be right unless she figures out what’s wrong. She wakes up with the same restless energy, unmoored and adrift in the same sadness that sent her to Schitt’s Creek in the first place, hoping to win Patrick back. She gets bangs. They don’t look right, either. Her life with Patrick still feels like a fog, something she can see but can’t touch. Now that Patrick isn’t a solution, she is starting to see how little he had to do with the problem, too.

Maybe he can still be helpful, though. _I stopped being sure_ , Patrick said on the swings, _and I had answers_. So slowly, slowly, she lets go of the things she’s sure of.

* * *

THURSDAYS AT the Parks Services Department are always full of meetings, culminating in the full staff meeting at three. 

“I remain convinced that three o’clock meetings are proof that no one in this department knows what they’re doing,” Angie says, sitting next to her.

Ethan lands on her other side with a sigh, face still buried in his phone. “They do know what they’re doing. They’re trying to torture us and it’s working.”

Ethan is Rachel’s age and kind of grumpy all the time, which Rachel finds endlessly funny. Angie is a year younger, manages all the communications for the department, and always has really good ideas. Now that Rachel has been paying more attention, she knows that her always bold lipstick shade changes to coordinate with her vintage patterned dresses. Sometimes it’s a sharp red, other times a peachy pink, other times a deep merlot. She’s Rachel’s closest friend at work. She’s also married to her high school boyfriend, so Rachel lets herself look sometimes, but nothing else. It’s not like something’s going to happen between them. 

“How’s the Westlake Park project coming, Rach?” Angie asks with that earnest eyes-on-you interest that makes her so likeable. There’s nothing going on between them, but there is possibly, definitely, something going on with Rachel. 

“It’ll be done by the end of the month, and then I go back to being an underemployed landscape architect,” Rachel says. Working on a project that actually uses some of her skills has made her acutely aware of how miserable she is with her day-to-day responsibilities. 

“It’s a paycheck,” Ethan says with a shrug. 

The phrase eats at her during the first half of the meeting. Patrick always used to say that too. _It’s a paycheck_. They haven’t talked again except for her text letting him know she got home safely. She thinks about asking him if he still feels that way. She doesn’t.

And it _is_ a paycheck. It’s steady and predictable and she knows how to do everything she’s expected to do. The job is close to her parents and her friends, most of whom she’s had since high school. When Patrick was part of the package, those all seemed like pros. They were going to get married and start a family and a low-stress, steady paycheck seemed ideal. Now, she’s not sure. 

Later, she texts Alexis. 

_Does Patrick like his job?_

The answer is immediate. _Oh my god, yes. Who knows why, because it’s just a store? And not even a busy or important one like Sephora or something. But he LOVES it. He’s super weird._  
_Like in a cute way obvs!_

Rachel smiles. _Obviously._

Another message, her dad this time: _Can I ride with you to the party tomorrow?_

_What party?_

_Linda and Alan’s anniversary_  
_Linda and Alan Brewer,_ he adds, in case it’s not appropriate to refer to her ex’s aunt and uncle by their first names even though she’s known them for two decades.

Rachel groans at her phone. _I’ll pick you up at five_

THE PARTY isn’t terrible, which is apparently the metric she’s using to measure events in her life these days. Perhaps because Patrick vacated his life with these people, there’s still plenty of room for her in it. And that’s been nice, really, that she didn’t have to lose their people when their engagement ended. But they don’t really feel like her people. Sometimes, with them, she feels like she’s stuck as the fifteen year old girl who first started cuddling with Patrick on the porch swing after school, who first started showing up at birthday parties and anniversary parties like this one, feeling wide-eyed and welcomed by their sharp humor and loud, happy voices.

She barely gets her dad safely handed off to his friends around the grill when she’s intercepted by Marcy Brewer.

“Rachel!” is the only warning she gets before being enveloped in one of Marcy’s warm, tight hugs. 

“Marcy,” she says, squeezing back. Everything between her and Patrick aside, Marcy has been like a mother to her since she lost her own mom six years ago. 

They get the catching up out of the way, and Rachel is about to make an excuse about finding Patrick’s cousins when Marcy reaches for her hand and tugs her to the side of the house. 

“Do you still talk to Patrick, dear?”

“Um. Not much,” she hedges. 

“Well, darn.” Marcy frowns. “I’ve been trying to reach him at the store since he didn’t come home for the holidays but I always end up talking to his business partner. Did you know he’d started a business with a friend there?”

“I did,” Rachel says. Marcy is boring through her with those concern-filled eyes and Rachel knows she has to say more or Marcy will be suspicious. _Dammit, Patrick._ “They seem to be making it work.”

“Yes. He’s such a nice young man. David.”

“I’ve never met him.” Which is basically true, thank god. 

“He seems happy. Of course I always hoped things would work out between you,” she says, and Rachel feels a small pang of sympathy for Patrick. She wonders how many times Marcy has said that to him since they broke up. 

“Me too.” That’s basically true, too, or it was. It’s not anymore, she realizes. Which is a relief.

“There you are, dear. Oh hi, Rachel,” Clint says, waving and giving his wife’s shoulders a loving squeeze. 

“Hey.” Rachel wonders if Clint is going to save her or help his wife dig.

“It’s good to see you. Your dad says you’re responsible for that new park off Highway 10.”

“Yes. It’s a natural playspace concept. It was really fun,” Rachel says. 

Clint asks her more questions, the kind of questions that make her think of Patrick again. Questions about what’s next. About leveraging this success into the next one. About hoping people see what she has to offer so they can give her more responsibility.

Finally they all get pulled away for speeches and cake, and Rachel takes her seat next to her dad, staring at Patrick’s contact in her phone. 

_I saw your parents at a party. I didn’t tell them anything._

Maybe she could say something else. Something easy. Something easy enough to ignore if he wants. But what? The fact that she doesn’t know how to talk to her best friend anymore is just one more frustration. She misses him. She misses him so much. But she’s no longer sure what to say to him. _I’m terrified to be without you, and also maybe I’m gay, too,_ seems like a lot for a text message.

She types, _I kind of understand why you haven’t told them either._

“I know you’re very important, but maybe you can put your phone away until we get home,” her dad mutters with an elbow. Rachel slips her phone into her pocket without sending it.

Later, when Rachel pulls up in front of her childhood home to drop him off, the porch lights are glinting warmly from either side of the front door. She remembers her mom and dad deciding to forgo the electrician and install them themselves. They argued all day until both lights were more disassembled than when they’d taken them out of the box. 

Her father drove off in a huff to the hardware store for some kind of special tool and her mother lounged in the hammock with _A Tree Grows in Brooklyn_ , one of her comfort books that she must have read in whole or in part at least a hundred times. She’d gone to university in Brooklyn before she met Rachel’s dad. 

“It’s not the Brooklyn I remember,” she’d said once when Rachel asked. “It takes place many years before. But it reminds me of the specificity of it. The way the place matters to you when you live there.”

Before her life with Patrick became so specifically about Patrick, she used to look for that wherever she lived. A specificity of place. 

Rachel found her parents making out in the basement after they put the tools away, much to everyone’s embarrassment and, she’ll admit, her own vague sense of relief.

“Well, thanks for the lift,” her dad says.

“Dad, wait.”

He stops, hand still on the door handle. 

“I’m moving.” The sureness in her voice surprises them both. 

He breathes a sigh of _oh is that all?_ and turns to leave again. “I guess this means I need to fix the hitch on the trailer.”

“No, um. I think I’m moving away. New York.” She thinks about her mom in the hammock. “Maybe Brooklyn. Like mom.”

He lets go of the handle and sits back.

“I don’t follow. Did you get a job or—”

“Not yet.”

“Isn’t it kind of expensive?”

“Probably,” she says, and the fact that she doesn’t know, that she’s announcing a plan without knowing any of the details, is kind of thrilling. She used to make choices like this all the time, before she and Patrick became so good at being reasonable adults. 

She’s expecting an argument but instead he laughs. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you but I like it.”

“Me too.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m not going to worry about you every day.”

“I know.” She turns in her seat so she can see him better. “It’s just hard to move on from him here when it still feels like he’s everywhere.”

He furrows his bushy gray eyebrows. “I worry about you every day here, too. That part won’t change much for me. So when do you intend to leave me?”

Rachel rolls her eyes and he laughs. They’ve done this silly faux-guilt-trip exchange so many times, but the sheer normalcy now, after telling him something so big and uncertain, rights her world again. 

“I’m hoping to find something by the fall.”

“Okay. Plenty of time to get used to the idea.”

She nods. “For both of us.” She hopes she’s right.

THE PROBLEM with announcing a plan when she doesn’t actually _have_ a plan is that success is nowhere near guaranteed. But she keeps telling people anyway, even puts in notice at work and plans to leave as soon as the Westlake Park project is finished. Cold-calling and sending her CV to a thousand firms doesn’t work, so she calls up some friends from university, people she worked with on Toronto’s Green Roof Strategy. No one is hiring but someone has a friend of a friend of a friend at the Brooklyn Grange and they’re hiring a landscape architect. She looks it up and can’t make the call fast enough. 

They’re worried about hiring someone from so far away, but she assures them she has a friend in New York she can stay with until she figures out her living situation. It’s not a truth, not a lie. The friend is Lou Beckett, and she was a counselor at Camp Woolsey for the first four summers Rachel went there. And they’re still friends on Facebook, even though neither of them seems to spend any time there. 

Lou’s profile doesn’t have much. The last post is two years old, it’s just a photo of her arm with a street grid stretched across it like a sleeve. _New tattoo!_ is all it says. Rachel studies it for two full minutes and tries to imagine what Lou might be like now, all these years later. There’s not much to go on. The rest of her posts are pictures of her cat and the occasional post about the city. 

_It’s Rachel from Camp Woolsey. Not sure if you remember me. Anyway I’m moving to Brooklyn for work and I know you live (lived?) there. Thought I would say hi._

There’s no reply for days, which sends Rachel scouring apartment listings in a panic until a week later, her phone buzzes.

_Rachel! Of course I remember you! I’m never on Facebook but I’d love to catch up when you get here._

She sends her phone number, too. Rachel texts her from her new phone, with her new American number, so she’ll have it. 

She isn’t sure how to go from ‘hey remember me?’ to ‘help!’ with someone she hasn’t seen since she was fourteen, so she returns to the apartment listings. She has no idea which apartments are good and which are bad. If she should be close to work or rely on public transit. She doesn’t know which areas are safe, and she can’t tell by the prices because neighboring apartments with similar amenities and of similar size seem to vary in rent by many hundreds of dollars. And it doesn’t matter because she still can’t afford any of the listings that seem acceptable.

A few hours later, her phone buzzes. It’s Lou. _Where in Brooklyn?_

_Not sure yet. Still looking._ And then, because what does she have to lose? _Know anyone looking for a roommate?_

Lou’s reply is immediate: _Yes! Me!_

_Really?!_

_What’s your email? I’ll send you details._

Lou emails her within the hour and gives her a day or two to think about it. Rachel keeps getting distracted and opening the email again. She flips through the photos Lou sent until she has them memorized, the narrow windows crowded by potted plants, the 1920s mosaic tile bathroom, the tall baseboards and warm, weathered wood floor and rich colors that seem to calm each other so that even the boldest of them isn’t shouting. The walls are clean and mostly empty, but the bookshelf is sagging with effort, volumes resting on top of each row of books and in a low stack on the floor in front. 

The apartment is a one-bedroom but the living room, which would be Rachel’s room, is separated by French doors, so it would be sort of private, but maybe not as private as she hoped. Still, with a roommate, the rent is doable. It will be easier to look for something else while she’s there if it doesn’t work out. And best of all, it’s only a couple of blocks from Prospect Park, a place she’s always wanted to see in person.

When she tells Lou that, she responds, _Now you can go there every day if you want._

After a day to think about it, Rachel reads through Lou’s list of features one last time, and what’s included and not. Lou also attaches a list of “quirks” which include roommate deal-breakers that Rachel thinks are perfectly reasonable, including: 1. Wash dirty dishes immediately; 6. Fucking recycle your junk mail, it’s the twenty-first century; 13. No hanging laundry on the shower rod; and 18. The thermostat has to be above 72 at all times because I’m basically cold-blooded. 

She thinks about replying to the email but that feels... businesslike, and they’re friends. Sort of. 

She returns to their text string _I’m in!_ It’s a good feeling, making a choice that’s not rational. About goddamn time, Covington. 

_Yay!!!_

Rachel smiles again. Can’t stop smiling. 

_I promise I won’t keep you up all night like I did at camp._

_Ha! I’d almost forgotten._

She and Lou hadn’t interacted much at first, but then Rachel caught a frog and got in trouble for bringing it back to the cabin to make a habitat for it. One of the other counselors was about to report her but Lou put her foot down and helped Rachel rehome the frog safely along the bank of the creek. 

The frog shit on Lou’s hand while they were walking, which made her angry. She swore a lot, and even though Rachel and her friends swore sometimes, it was still funny to hear someone in charge go off like that. 

“What were you thinking?” Lou asked on the way back, hands dipped in the creek and coated in hand sanitizer.

“Maybe it’s a prince!” Rachel tried, embarrassed. Then, when Lou scowled a warning, she told her the truth. “I—I just miss my friends.” Her friends. Patrick, his cousins, her brother, and the three or four other boys that they hung around with digging up worms and chasing frogs down the banks of the creek behind her parents’ house.

Even before they were dating, she spent most of her time with Patrick and his friends. The Girl Guides camp had been her mother’s last-ditch effort to help her make some friends of her own. It hadn’t worked, really. Back then, she didn’t see the value in a world that wasn’t surrounded by him. A lot of her sadness toward Patrick has been redirected at herself these days, at the girl who never really knew her place outside of him.

Lou didn’t really say anything to her explanation for the frog, not that she can remember anyway. But from then on she invited Rachel along to whatever she was doing, and Rachel thought she was the coolest girl she’d ever met. They stayed up late talking on more than one night, and even though Lou must be seven years older, it felt like talking to a friend. 

Enough time goes by that Rachel thinks maybe she’s ruined the easy texting back and forth, until she gets another message. 

_Those nights with you were my favorite part of camp._

A sharp zing travels up Rachel’s spine. She wonders if on those nights she was nursing a crush she didn’t know was a crush. But she doesn’t think so. The Lou she remembers was kind of brash, with the sort of gives-no-fucks attitude Rachel always admired but could never quite master herself. Which also made her a little intimidating. She was usually quiet, but sometimes she would erupt in laughter, which was contagious. She had long, thick dark hair and acne and glasses that were too big for her face. They would slide down in the summer heat until she gave up and pushed them up above her forehead. She had a small stud in her nose, and Rachel remembers that sometimes, when Lou was too busy with an activity to notice, Rachel would look more closely at it. 

Rachel wouldn’t have known how to filter any of that in romantic terms. She was too busy fending off the whispers that had already started about her friendship with Patrick, about what good friends they were, and how cute they were together. How cute he was generally, standing at the ready at first base or hair mussed from his hockey helmet. How cute she was generally, holding vigil at every game, biting her nails and ripping her ticket into tiny, nervous pieces. 

In those days, crushes were when you were friends with someone and everyone else started talking about what a cute couple you would make, and got progressively more annoying about it until you either kissed someone else to shut them up or awkwardly kissed each other. She and Patrick had awkwardly kissed each other and never looked back. Until they did, of course. 

If someone had seen her and Lou laughing by the creek or running around chasing fireflies or curled up in rickety wooden bunks across from each other, whispering late into the night, she doesn’t think anyone would have suggested they were cute together. Even if they were.

 _Me too_ , Rachel replies.

Lou sends a smiley-face. _That reminds me. I do have one more condition: You have to promise not to bring any frogs into our home._

Rachel stares at the _our home_. Rachel would live in Lou’s cupboard if it meant she didn’t have to live in a strange city with a total stranger. Amazingly, it seems like she’s getting much more than that. 

_I’m done looking for princes_

THEY KEEP exchanging messages. The frequency increases until Rachel just sort of expects that when she looks at her phone, there will be a message from Lou amid her email and news notifications. And usually, there is. Rachel begins to have an idea of what Lou is up to, and vice versa, so that on her last day of work, Lou texts, _Good luck!_ and the morning before she leaves for the airport Lou texts, _Have a safe flight!_


	2. Chapter 2

“NO, DAD, it’s the next one,” Rachel says, pointing to the Air Canada drop off zone. 

“Sorry, sorry.” He pulls past the Larry Air sign and puts the car in park before pushing the button to open the trunk. They’re all business as he helps her transfer her suitcases onto the curb. 

“You sure I can’t walk you to security at least?” he asks, pushing up on the nose of his glasses. 

“They’ll tow your car.” She hopes she sounds practical and not like she’s about to cry. 

He looks at her then, his dark green eyes sharp. “You’ll call me when you get there. And for the first week at least, I want a text at least once a day.”

“Okay, Dad,” she says, rolling her eyes performatively. “No more CSI: New York reruns for you.”

“And send me pictures of your place.”

“I already showed you pictures.”

“I’ll feel better when I see some with your stuff in them.” He presses the button on the top of the handle of her big rolling suitcase and watches it slide up and down, avoiding eye contact.

“Dad...”

“You know, when you and Patrick were supposed to get married today, I was sort of prepared to give you away. But this is...” He blinks a few times and clears his throat.

“Not what you had in mind,” she finishes for him, trying to keep the quiver out of her own voice.

“No. But it’s good,” he declares. “I know it hasn’t been easy these past few months.”

“Yeah.” She takes the handle of the suitcase from him and tries her best to meet his eyes. 

She isn’t going to tell him the rest of it, but she keeps thinking about Marcy Brewer at the party and the look in her eyes longing for answers.

“Also, I think I might be, um. Not straight.” She doesn’t know what she is, who she is. Not yet. But she’s sure about who she’s not. 

“Not straight what?” he says. “Oh! Oh.” 

She looks at her hands while he processes and wishes she’d chosen somewhere besides the sidewalk outside the departures terminal for this.

“Well. I feel like I should ask you something,” he says. “But I can’t think of anything I need to know. I just want you to be happy. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s with a guy or a girl or—”

“I think I got it.” She looks up at him again. “And thanks.”

“Anyway I’ll let you go,” he says. He kisses her cheek goodbye but pauses as he’s getting back into the car. “Lambchop, I do want you to be happy with someone. But if your mother were here, she would say that we also want you to be happy _without_ someone. You know?”

“I thought we said no more Lambchop,” she whispers. 

He waves her off. “You’re leaving me. Let me have it this one time.”

Rachel rolls her eyes. “One time, and that’s it. I—I should go. I love you.”

“Love you too.” He kisses her forehead and hands her the various bags until she has everything. “Text me!” he calls after her. “Send pictures!”

“I will,” she promises, and then the sliding doors close between them.

THE FLIGHT is turbulent, which gives her a place to lay blame for her rolling stomach, but it continues to twist well into the cab ride from the airport. 

“80 Winthrop Street,” Rachel says, and then watches the route on her phone for the forty minutes from JFK to Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Lou’s square section of Brooklyn east of Prospect Park that she’ll be calling home for now. 

The city starts to feel specifically Not Home about halfway through the drive, when the buildings get a little bit taller and move closer to the street, the trees fewer and farther between. It doesn’t feel specifically New York either, although apart from its famous iconography, she’s not sure she would recognize it if it did. The city doesn’t feel like anywhere yet, just an anonymous collection of brick and stone, the styles of more than a century jumbled together to form an uneven line of hard-sided sentinels at the sidewalk edge. 

The cab pulls up in front of the address, a five-story brick building. She peers up at the umber brick façade as the cab pulls away. Windows blink back at her under austere arches; a black fire escape crawls up the front. It looks a lot like the building next to it and two of the buildings across the street, hulking over a few of the remaining houses with tidy gardens that must have once lined the whole block.

After some internal deliberation about whether she should use the call box at the door or send a text, she pushes the button next to 4A. 

“Hello?”

“Um, hi, Lou? It’s um. It’s Rachel.” Very smooth, Covington.

“Hi Rachel! Elevator’s to your right. Come on up. I’ll leave the door open.” The staticky connection breaks off abruptly before a buzz signals the door is unlocked. The building is nicer than she expected, with decorative plaster adorning the walls and ceilings of the mail and stair lobby and the recess in front of the elevator. 4A is just to the left when she drags her luggage off the elevator, the door already cracked open. 

“Hello?” Rachel calls, nudging it open to reveal a long hallway with a bike mounted on the wall. The hall terminates in a kitchen that is also the dining room that is also the laundry room, as evidenced by the bras draped over the backs of the kitchen chairs. Rachel’s old friend and new roommate is half-hidden under the table. 

Her greeting is muffled and followed by a growled “Fuck!” as she bangs her head on the rim of the table. 

“Are you okay?” Rachel asks. 

“Oh sure.” She shakes it off and smiles around a frazzled hello. “The dryer downstairs is broken and I got delayed and now I’m just trying to clean up a bit. I’m not messy, I swear.”

Rachel manages to squeeze out a hello in return, but just barely. The whole time they’ve been texting, Rachel was imagining Lou as sort of a grown-up version of the girl she remembered. And she is that, but Rachel’s imagination was severely lacking. She’s still short, probably shorter than Rachel now, but she’s grown into her shoulders and hips so that she’s all soft edges. Her eyes are a shocking gradient, dark brown at the edge of the iris blended into a shimmering gold at the center. Her scattering of freckles has grown darker with age. The contrast is striking.

 _Say something, Covington_ “I was, um, going to say. When you said no laundry hanging on the shower rod I didn’t realize you meant hang it in the kitchen instead.” 

Lou’s eyes narrow and her mouth curves, like _game on_. “You’re early. Please don’t tell me you’re one of those people who has to be everywhere two hours early.”

“Definitely not,” Rachel says, very much _not looking_ at something black and lacy still scrunched in Lou’s hand from when she retrieved it from under the table. When she turns her arm to discard the item into the laundry basket, a tattoo dances into sight on the inside of her forearm, and then retreats back to her side before Rachel can see what it is. “That would be obnoxious. Five minutes is early enough.” Lou’s smile is quick and bright and comes with a little shake of her head. “What?”

“I can’t wait to see how you do with the commute,” Lou says. 

“Yeah I’m really worried about that, actually,” Rachel blurts, and then her cheeks flush with embarrassment. Lou’s smile softens, and she tips her head, accentuating the asymmetrical cut of her dark, wavy hair. Her eyes narrow, not with a smile this time, but with a question, and Rachel finds herself shrugging. _Yeah, I’m a mess_ , she hopes it says. Lou might as well know now. 

The corners of Lou’s mouth curve upwards, lopsided and wry. “Let’s get some lunch,” she decides.

“Oh that’s okay.” Rachel waves her off. “I had a big breakfast. I think I’ll just get settled in.”

“We’ll go the long way. I’ll give you a tour of the neighborhood and show you the nearest stop on the Q.”

“The Q?”

“Your train.”

“Oh,” Rachel says. She hasn’t even seen the rest of the apartment yet, but it does sound kind of nice to work from the outside in, get her bearings a bit. “Okay. Yeah.”

“THIS IS my favorite cheap lunch spot near us,” Lou says as they sit down for lunch at Peppa’s Jerk Chicken.

They ordered the signature dish; Lou insisted with a let-me-show-you-the-world curve to her smile that started to release the tightly-wound bundle of nerves in Rachel’s gut. As easy as Lou has made the move, every step from their apartment to this little storefront felt like a steady pulse of big-change-big-change-big-change. 

“So are you still in touch with anyone else from Camp Woolsey?” Rachel asks. They haven’t even scratched the surface of everything she wants to know. 

“Just my ex, and I wouldn’t say in touch. More like in litigation.” Lou shrugs easily but her mouth tightens just so. 

“Oh,” Rachel says, processing several things at once, starting with what it means to have an ex from an all-girls camp. “I didn’t know you were, um—queer. Is that the word you use?”

Lou’s grin splits open. “I like lesbian for the specificity. But it doesn’t always roll off the tongue. Sometimes I say queer. Or gay. Sapphic when I’m feeling poetic.” She says the last part like a joke but Rachel doesn’t get it. She tips her head, studying Rachel anew. “Should I have said something before?”

“No,” Rachel says quickly. “No. It’s just. I am too. I think. Queer, that is. I don’t know if I can be more specific yet. I haven’t really, like, tried? With anyone. Can you know if you haven’t tried? Anyway I probably should have said something because I’m only just kind of figuring it out and I’m kind of embarrassed—not about being, you know, just that it took me all this time and sort of a major fail in my personal life to consider it—and this is the first time I’ve ever said queer, even, and—” 

“Rach.” Lou interrupts her with eyes that are kind and humor-filled. “You don’t have to explain. I’m just glad you’re here.” Rachel doesn’t think she just means here in Brooklyn. She leans back against the chair, smiling across the table at the first person she’s met in a long time who she gets to meet just as herself, just as she wants to be. Well, almost as she wants to be. Minus the fumbling. 

Lou’s eyes turn just a shade darker as she leans forward. “And you can, by the way. Know. Even if you haven’t tried.”

Rachel can feel her mouth fall open and Lou smiles, back to normal except now Rachel can’t look at her without seeing it, the way she looks when she turns up the heat. Oh fuck, yeah, you can definitely know. 

“Should I, um, ask about the ex in litigation?”

Lou startles like she forgot she mentioned it. She takes the straw out of the wrapper and stabs it into her water glass. “We started a game development company together. It failed. She’s trying to get out of her share of what we owe the bank and the investors.” Lou twists the straw wrapper around her fingers, and Rachel notices a tattoo between her middle and ring fingers. That’s three so far including the Facebook post. She wonders what they mean. 

“How can she do that if you started the company together?” Rachel asks.

“We’d been together for eight years. I was stupid and assumed it was for the long haul. We didn’t do the paperwork that we should have done separating our assets and contributions. Our first two games that failed were my idea. I was in charge of all the creative decisions. It was easy for her to make everything look like she was just helping me with the bookkeeping.”

“I’m sorry, Lou,” Rachel says. What else can she say? “Do you have a chance at winning the suit?”

“Not anymore,” Lou says, looking up at Rachel again. “I just agreed to pay it all last week. Now that I have a roommate I can afford the full payment.”

“Lou.” 

Lou waves her off. “Honestly I'm more pissed that she took the cat. I’ve spent the last year since we broke up scraping every cent I can into my savings account so I can pay my lawyer. I just want to move on. I want to be free of her more than I want the money.”

Lou clearly doesn’t want empathy. Her shoulders and jaw are set firm again as she eats. She’s always been really strong. Rachel knows what it’s like to have a relationship end, and to have all your future plans turn to dust and fall through your fingers because of it. So she also knows that sometimes, you just want to tell someone what happened so they know why you’re sad sometimes, and have them treat you like that’s normal.

“So, what’s the second favorite lunch spot?” Rachel asks. 

Lou’s eyes flash up, and then her shoulders relax. “PLG on Rogers and Midwood. It’s my number one for breakfast. You have to try the bacon, egg, and cheese on a biscuit.”

Rachel makes a face. Lou rolls her eyes. “Trust me.”

“I will,” Rachel says quietly, and then tips her head to her food to hide the pink rising up her cheeks. 

WHEN THEY get back to the apartment, Lou finishes showing her where she can keep her personal items in the bathroom, her food in the kitchen, her clothes in the hall closet. Rachel spends the day unpacking, trying to settle the parts of herself that still feel adrift. She starts work the following Monday. There are so many new people to meet and things to learn. Which is a rush, actually. God.

The whole first week is a rush, for all that it’s scary and overwhelming sometimes. She loved living in Toronto for the brief time she managed to talk Patrick into it. They moved back near their hometown after two years, after yet another breakup and reconciliation. Patrick wanted exactly the life they had in rural Canada, but it’s clear now that he needed a different person to share it with. It takes two days in Brooklyn to realize that in wanting exactly him, she missed how much she needed a different life. 

On her fourth day at work, she recognizes the blue and pink separated by a purple stripe on a pin on the shoulder bag strap of one of her new coworkers. “I like your pin,” she says, casually.

“Thanks.” They smile at each other with a kind of knowing spark. “I’m Max. Head beekeeper.”

“Rachel. Assistant Project Manager in Design/Build. I just started here.”

“Oh, nice. Liking it so far?”

“Loving it,” she says, and means it.

* * *

LOU HAS friends over for some kind of epic role-playing game on the first Saturday of the month. Since Rachel is in the living room, there’s only the dining table, which, when they fold out the leaves, spills well into the hallway. Lou’s character is a half-elf named Ferro who is frankly not very nice, and Rachel finds herself lingering in the kitchen to listen to Lou squabble with a pair of halflings who are always dragging the game off-track. 

“Rachel, what are you doing tomorrow?” asks Mateo, one of the halflings and Lou’s best friend from work. “The Strategist is having an open gaming tournament and we need a sixth.”

“I rented a van so I can go to IKEA and buy some furniture,” Rachel says.

“Wait, you’re going by yourself?” Eva asks. 

Rachel shrugs. “Yeah.”

“Lou, you have to go with her,” Eva says, and widens her eyes meaningfully at Lou, which earns her a glare in return.

“I offered. She said she’s got it.” Lou shrugs again like that should be the end of it.

“Well, she’s new here. She doesn’t know what she’s got. Ow!” Eva cries after what must be some kind of pain inflicted under the table. 

“Roll for Bluff,” Trev says, handing Rachel an odd multi-sided die. 

Rachel has no idea what ‘Roll for Bluff’ means, but she rolls anyway. It teeters before landing on twelve. 

“Lou? Will save?”

Lou scowls while she rolls. Rachel realizes Lou’s die is the same as the one she has tattooed on the inside of her forearm, which slots another piece of the puzzle into place. It’s a ten, which has to mean Rachel won, right? 

Trev makes a show of tabulating on his fingers. “Okay. I’m afraid we have to deduct two points from you, Rachel, for having no Knowledge-Local and Lou does have a high Wisdom, adding three to her Will save, which means you tried—somewhat feebly I might add—but were unable to talk Lou out of joining you at IKEA.”

“I’m not even playing this game!” Rachel laughs, exasperated.

“You know what they say,” Eva adds, putting a shoe up on her chair and resting her chin on her knee to look sweetly at Lou. “If you and your roommate can survive a trip to IKEA, you’ll be together a long time.”

“I don’t think that’s about roommates,” Trev says with a snort.

“Hey. The dice know,” Eva says. 

Lou shakes her head and swipes her die back. “Okay, well it’s my turn and I think that Ferro stabs Gazella with a knife just because they’ve been very annoying today.”

“Hey, what? No friendly fire!” Eva cries. 

Lou looks with satisfaction at the seventeen facing upwards on the die. “A hit! And you started it.”

“I’ll let you get back to this. Sorry to interrupt.” Rachel attempts to sneak back to her room.

“No, nope, that’s enough,” Trina says, adjusting the toque over her short pink hair. “That’s your fifth one tonight. No more unnecessary apologies.”

“Sorry, Rach. Trina has a thing about women apologizing when they’ve done nothing wrong,” Lou explains. Trina has come over a few times, mostly just to hang before or after she and Lou go out or meet up with Mateo. Rachel doesn’t think Trina likes her much.

“Yet, knowing this, you just apologized on my behalf,” Trina says. 

“I’m sorry,” Lou says again, this time to Trina. She kisses the scowl lines on Trina’s cheek and picks up another, smaller die to roll. 

Rachel lets them get on with their game and returns to her room to unfold the couch into the bed where she’s been sleeping the last few weeks. It’s not very comfortable, but it’s bought her some time to get her bearings. Still, it takes a long time to fall asleep when she can hear Lou’s laughter in the kitchen, when she can’t stop thinking about the conversation that Lou and Eva were having with their eyes, or about Lou kissing Trina’s cheek.

IT TAKES longer to get the rental van than it does to drive to IKEA. It takes longer to find the furniture than it does to do either of those things combined. Rachel has a list of what she needs from the website, including the self-serve area aisle and bin numbers, but Lou isn’t having that. 

“If you’re going to drag me all the way out to IKEA then we’re getting the full experience,” she says, marching toward the showrooms. 

“All the way? It’s not even five miles.”

“Exactly.” 

Lou opens cabinets and inspects hardware and tests out rug pile in the various room setups like she’s furnishing a whole house instead of looking for a few items for Rachel. 

“Sit,” Lou says when they get to the desk chairs. 

“Why?”

Lou gives her a look. “Your posture is very important to me,” she drawls. 

Rachel sits in the chair she’s intending to buy and Lou spins it so Rachel is facing her. “I had this one for a while and the seat was all wrong for me.”

“Well if I spent as much time at my desk as you do at yours, I would probably get a nicer one.” 

“I have a very important job,” Lou says. 

“No job is worth sixty plus hours a week.”

Lou fidgets with the plastic tag. “I’m due for a promotion, and then it will ease up and I’ll be able to breathe again.”

“I think that’s just America talking,” Rachel says kindly.

“Yeah,” Lou says. “Probably.” She looks down at her lap, tucking her sneakers behind the wheels of the chair, and Rachel worries she killed the mood. Lou is obviously tight on funds, and it’s clear she’s only working her current job because her own business imploded. 

Rachel wiggles in the seat, which is getting sort of uncomfortable. “Maybe something’s wrong with your ass. This one feels pretty good to me.”

Lou shakes her head and sits in a chair next to her, giving it a spin. “There is nothing wrong with my ass.” 

Rachel very nearly agrees out loud. “Let me try that one,” Rachel says instead. Lou gets up and gestures to the chair with a flourish that makes Rachel laugh. Rachel tries it. Lou is right. It’s better. She amends her list. 

“Which one are you getting?” Lou asks, peering over her shoulder. This close, she smells like jasmine, warm and inviting. 

“None of your business,” Rachel says, and walks toward bedding. 

“I knew it!” Lou calls after her, and follows. 

Rachel falls back on the mattress she identified as the most likely candidate based on firmness and material. It feels good. She looks up to catch Lou staring at the foot of the bed. “What?”

“Nothing,” Lou says. She collapses onto the one next to it, putting her a couple of inches higher. 

“I like this one.”

“Now you’re just being contrary. I’m the one who actually has to sleep on it.”

Lou is silent for a minute, chewing at her lip like she’s thinking about what to say. “You’re right,” she says, and then stands. “C’mon, you can buy me lunch.”

“Okay, but eating at IKEA sounds like one of those things you would tell me real New Yorkers don’t do,” Rachel says. 

“What can I say, I’m weak for Swedish meatballs. Must be the Canadian talking.”

“That makes no sense,” Rachel says.

“You better not start arguing with me now, Rach. Our entire roommate relationship is riding on the success of this day.”

“Of course. You’re right. Meatballs it is.” 

When their food is nearly finished, Lou opens the bag of Dala horses she bought and offers a few to Rachel. 

“Thanks,” she says. “Um, Lou?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you and Trina, like… together?”

“Oh, no. No no no. No no _no_ no no.” 

“No?” To her own ears, she sounds dumb and relieved.

“Trina was my first roommate in New York. I love her, but she’s too grouchy for me. We did have a thing, for a really short time, but I’m pretty sure we’d kill each other if we couldn’t disappear to separate apartments at the end of the day.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“I sort of can’t imagine what that would be like, to do that whole thing again anyway.”

“Do what? Trina?” 

Lou laughs. “No. That was fun. I just mean the whole relationship thing. Love.” Rachel isn’t sure what to say to that, because it crushes her more than she expects it to. Lou shrugs and takes hold of Rachel’s cart as they return to shopping. “It’s just hard to imagine feeling safe with someone again.”

“Yeah,” Rachel says, because she feels that too. It’s not that she didn’t feel safe with Patrick in the moment, but the memories don’t feel safe. They’re built on a shaky stack of doubt and ignorance and questions they were too afraid to ask, let alone answer. 

One time, when they’d just gotten back together, they’d talked about making things better. Someone had tied him up, and he’d liked it, and he wondered if maybe she would try it. She did, and it had taken both of them by surprise. He’d been dripping before she touched anything but the ropes at his wrists, came harder than she’d ever seen him. After, he kissed her and let her rub cream on the marks on his wrists and kissed her again, and they’d talked for hours into the night, and laughed, and kissed more just because. He didn’t immediately fall asleep like usual, or rush to clean up and mumble things about work the next day. They tried it again, other ways, and she’d learned to push him. It felt like a breakthrough. It was the happiest they’d been since high school, and not even because of the sex, just because he’d look at her afterwards like someone who understood him.

Now, she wonders if she did something wrong. If they would have been happier looking for new people who _actually_ understood them instead of working so hard to unlock some complex code in each other. If every new thing that burned hot and fizzled out brought him closer to realizing she would never be who he wanted. Maybe if she’d never... And that’s the problem with this. If she’d never, and they’d married, and they’d built a life together for real, they might be stuck there, the walls of that life trapping both of them inside. 

“Did I lose you?” Lou asks, nudging her with her shoulder. 

“No. I was just overwhelmed by the off-gassing of laminate furniture,” Rachel jokes. 

“Happens to the best of us,” Lou says, and they push on toward the self-serve area for her remaining items. 

Rachel has to admit, it’s nice to have company. Not just company, but Lou. She still has that easy laugh, still seasons her words with a little salt, still makes Rachel feel seen when she smiles. Makes Rachel feel a lot of things when she smiles, in fact.

It’s different meeting Lou again now, as an adult. As an adult who is definitely interested in women. Lou seems softer than she did back then, less intent on using her sharp edges as weapons, but there’s something of the girl Rachel knew too. The blunt honesty, the easy humor, the way she lets Rachel past all those protections she has and makes her feel comfortable. She’s easy to talk to, smart, and Rachel can see it now for what it is, the kind of beautiful that hides behind a first impression. You might not look twice at her, but if you did, you wouldn’t look away.

WHEN THEY’RE finally standing back in the living room-turned Rachel’s bedroom, Lou scans the unassembled furniture parts. “Do you need me to help you set everything up?”

“No, that’s okay. I can manage.”

An hour later, when Rachel yelps as the part of the bed frame she’s supporting with her shoulder slides to the ground, nearly smashing her toes, Lou decides she can’t manage. She comes to the rescue, supporting the other end of the bed, while Rachel finishes screwing in the headboard. 

“Thanks,” Rachel says. “You’re sure I’m not keeping you from something you’d rather be doing?”

“I work seven days a week if nothing stops me. So. Stop me.”

Lou is still focused on the screw she’s tightening on the support legs which is good, because that way she doesn’t see what Rachel’s face is doing. 

They catch up while they work. Lou tells her more about the app developer she works for in Gowanus. She can’t talk about most of her projects but she has plenty of stories about her coworkers. Like Mateo, who snuck into her heart when he showed her the spreadsheet he keeps to manage the care of the twenty-three succulents in his office, and told her that the haworthia likes to be next to Joni Mitchell when she’s playing over his computer speakers.

“He seems a lot like Patrick. I got him into plants but he ran with it.”

“Patrick? As in, the guy you kept talking about during my last summer at camp, Patrick?”

“Yeah,” Rachel says. It sounds like a really long time put that way. And well, it is. “We broke up about a year-and-a-half ago.”

Lou stops, assembly instructions in one hand, the caster of Rachel’s desk chair in another. “Wait. How long did you date him?”

“Fifteen years, on and off,” Rachel says, and she’s glad to know that she can finally say that without a hot flare of shame.

“Fifteen years?” The caster rolls out of Lou’s hand. 

“Yeah. We were planning a wedding, and then one day he said he didn’t want to get married and by the end of the week he’d left town. Now he’s dating his business partner. David Rose.” Rachel says his name with a kind of reverence. She’d only seen him briefly as he stormed past, but she saw enough of who Patrick was in Schitt’s Creek to know he’s special. Lou’s eyes widen in understanding. “Anyway it’s dumb. I didn’t even get it then. I showed up hoping to win him back and found him at a barbecue with his boyfriend’s family.”

“That’s how you found out?” she asks. 

“Yeah. Anyway it’s fine.” Rachel has never once been able to successfully pretend things are fine.

“It doesn’t have to be.”

“I’m not mad he didn’t tell me when he figured it out. Not really. And I’m not mad that he’s gay of course. Maybe I was at first, but just in that angry-at-everything way you are sometimes when things don’t work out the way you want them to. I loved him. I think it mattered. It wasn’t wasted time to me, you know? I just... he didn’t tell David. About me. Not once in six months. I think that’s the part that still stings. Like maybe it _was_ a waste to him. Or it was bad enough he didn’t want to remember. Or. Or it meant nothing at all.”

Lou drops all pretense of assembling furniture and scoots over next to Rachel. 

“I don’t know him, obviously,” Lou says quietly, “but I know you. And I can’t imagine any person on the planet who would have gotten fifteen years with you and thought it was a waste.”

Rachel swipes at a tear and nods. “Thanks,” she whispers.

“And hey, it seems like Rachel Version 2.0 is running great so far.”

“You can say it, I’m a walking cliché.” Rachel smiles at her over the side panel of the desk. “Hard breakup, ill-advised bangs, moves to New York City in search of herself. I’ve seen the movie and I don’t even really like movies.”

“Don’t forget the initially scary but increasingly endearing lesbian roommate who graduated from the school of hard knocks.”

“I mean, yeah.” Rachel’s giggle breaks free. “You’re very scary. ”

“I’d like to think I’d be played by a thirty-something Frances McDormand. But the real question is—” Lou sets the screwdriver on the floor and leans closer. Her eyes are a deep rich brown now, their depths resistant to the glow of the string lights Rachel draped over the window frame. Rachel wonders how much they see. “How do you not like movies? Everyone likes movies!”

Rachel laughs again, shaking her head. “I just don’t. I get bored.”

“You’ve watched all of Parks and Recreation start to finish five times and I’ve only known you two months.”

“Oh I never rewatch Season One,” Rachel corrects, and she gets the eye roll she’s looking for. “That’s different.”

“How?”

“You don’t have to get invested right away. You can skip to the good part and have hours of show ahead of you.”

Lou shakes her head and looks at her, a subtle tsk on her tongue that itches along Rachel’s spine like a reward instead of a reprimand. 

“There’s not a single movie you like?”

“I liked _Titanic_.”

“Oh no.”

Rachel hides her answering smile in her water bottle. She feels bold tonight. Reckless. Like the cliche movie heroine they’re joking about. “Want to change my mind? I’ll give you three tries.”

“God, yes,” she says, and Rachel hears the way it might sound in other contexts. _God, yes._

“Tuesday? After work?” _Don’t chew your lip, Covington._

“We’ll try one on Tuesday. I get three nights to convince you. Don’t want you getting bored and trying to rush ahead to the good stuff.”

 _Even better,_ she doesn’t say. “Fine.”

“Fine.” Lou picks up the caster again, her victory disappearing into another soft smile. 

THE NEXT morning, Rachel wakes in her new bed feeling well-rested for the first time since she got to New York. She picks up her phone and stares at Patrick’s contact, imported from her Canadian phone. She wonders if he’s tried to contact her since she moved. If he’s realized that’s not her number anymore. She hadn’t responded to any of his messages since the couple she sent after his aunt and uncle’s anniversary party.

She could leave it at that, close one chapter, move onto the next. The problem is she has so much time and energy wrapped into the knowing of him. And she loves him. And she misses him. And it feels wrong to let all those years, all that energy, trail off into wounded silence. 

She’s stared at his contact before, typing and deleting a hundred heartfelt messages before settling for gibberish in the hope they would start talking again. She hardly recognizes that person.

She starts to type an apology and then deletes it, thinking about Trina and her command to stop apologizing. Because, really, she’s _not_ sorry. 

_Hey, this is Rachel_  
_I needed some space_  
_I moved to New York City – this is my new number_

Send.

She stares at the new message string. She could ask a question, maybe. How’s David? How’s the store? Have you told anyone back home? Maybe that’s too familiar and she should just stick with something generic. Simple. How are you?

If she asks a question he might feel like he has to respond. And she doesn’t want that. She wants them to stop owing each other.

She settles on _I wanted you to have it in case you ever want to talk_

The three dots show up right away.

_I’d like that. Free now?_

Rachel smiles at her phone like an idiot. “Yeah,” she says. And then types it, since he can’t hear her.

They exchange hellos and how are yous and then there’s a long, horrible pause. The silence hurts, like it’s not silent at all, like it’s screaming to fill all the space that’s expanded between them. 

“I finally got my own place here,” Patrick says. “It’s small and I had to get a bathroom door installed but I really like it.”

“Oh nice. You and David?”

“Uh, no. I want to but... not yet.”

“Is everything okay with you two?” Rachel is surprised how easy it is to ask, how much she cares.

“Yeah, yeah. Everything’s fine. I just... I think I almost messed it up. It scared me. But it is fine now.” 

“Uh oh. Did you overuse Prince Patrick’s Royal We?” she asks. 

“I—yeah. How did you guess?”

“Remember how irritated I used to be when you did that?”

“Yes, and then you used to ask every time I suggested we do something if I meant ‘we-me’ or ‘we-us.’ Which was also irritating.”

“That sounds awful. It’s amazing you lasted as long as you did, really.”

Patrick laughs in response, but it’s low and throaty. “I’m sorry it took me so long,” Patrick says, which is and isn’t a topic shift. 

“It’s not—” Rachel isn’t going to tell him, she really isn’t, and then she does. “If it makes you feel any better, it took me longer.”

“You couldn’t have known.”

“That’s—That’s not what I mean.”

There’s another long pause, but this one doesn’t hurt like the others. “So... both of us?”

“Yeah. Is that pathetic?”

“Maybe.”

“Well that’s not comforting at all. Geesh, Patrick.”

He laughs. “I love my life now, Rach. I love it. But sometimes I don’t really know what to do with everything that came before here. I need to tell my parents, I need to make it real there the way it is here. I just... can’t seem to find a way in.”

“Well. You don’t need to tell them until you’re ready.”

“Does your dad know?”

“Yeah. I told him at the airport before I left. And my brother over the holidays.”

“Wow. Good job.”

“We have different strengths,” Rachel says charitably. “And so do our parents.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyway, we should probably spread out the heavy self discovery stuff. Tell me something good.”

So he tells her about some guy who came in the store and flirted with him and gave him his number. When it’s her turn to tell him good things, she has so many to choose from. She tells him all the little stuff—Prospect Park and jerk chicken and the guy who plays incredible cello on the subway and Lou’s friends Trina and Mateo (“He reminds me a little of you”). And Max the beekeeper from work and _work_. How long has it been since work was one of the good things? And Lou. She tells him a little about Lou, but only the surface things. Not the way Lou’s smile makes her feel, or the way she hugs like she wants you to feel it after she lets go, or the way her eyes are so light sometimes they look like amber, like they could hold you forever. She wouldn’t be able to do Lou justice with words anyway.

They talk for two hours, and by the end, the silences are back, but they feel comfortable. The kind of silence you can have with someone who doesn’t need you to speak to understand you.

“David will probably wake up soon and we’re headed to a farmer’s market in Elm Glen today, so. I should go,” he says. 

“It was good to talk to you.”

“It was good to talk to you, too.”

Another silence. 

“Bye, Patrick.”

“Bye, Rach.”

Rachel hangs up and stretches back out on the bed, mindlessly counting the small nail holes below the crown molding, like someone had lights or something hung up around the perimeter. 

When Lou gets home, she finds Rachel still there, scrolling on her phone. “What, so now that I built you a bed you’re just going to spend all day in it?”

“Oh, sure, _you_ built it. And maybe. It’s very comfortable.”

“I never tried this mattress,” Lou says, laying down next to her. She’s over the covers and still wearing her jacket, but it feels kind of intimate. “Okay, you win. Let’s just stay here and not be adults for the rest of the day.”

“What would we do?”

Lou turns her head and looks at her, and Rachel feels that look sink into her gut. 

“What were you doing before I got here?” Lou asks.

“Talking to Patrick.”

“Ah. And how was that?”

“Surreal. Nice.”

“Surreal but nice?” Lou asks. 

“Sure.”

“Okay, Hugh.”

“Hugh?”

“Notting Hill? Hugh Grant tells Julia Roberts’s character that meeting her was surreal but nice.”

“Is that the one where he owns a bookstore?”

“Yes. A travel bookshop.”

“I think my mom liked that one.”

“Oh no, Rachel Covington. You, whose favorite movie is _Titanic_ , are not making me feel old about the nineties. Hand me your tablet. This can’t wait until Tuesday. ”

Rachel unplugs the tablet she bought herself as a moving-to-New York present and hands it to Lou, who swipes around until she finds what she’s looking for. 

“I didn’t say it was my favorite.” Rachel tries unsuccessfully for sour. “So we’re watching _Notting Hill_?” 

“No. I’m not wasting one of my three movie nights on that. We’re watching a different Hugh Grant movie, _Maurice_.”

“ _Maurice_?”

“Yes. Disclaimer, it’s made by white dudes in 1987, so, you know.” Lou makes a rolling gesture with her hands that is supposed to encompass everything that entails. “Anyway just watch.”

So she does. It’s just a movie, and kind of sad, but it’s also very gay. And lying in bed with Lou, close enough so they can both watch the small screen, Rachel feels very gay too.

* * *

ON TUESDAY, they watch _But I’m a Cheerleader_. In a very strange collision of worlds, she happened to mention to Patrick that they’re watching it, who happened to mention to David that they’re watching it, who happened to be appalled that Patrick had also never seen it. So now Lou and Rachel are watching it on Rachel’s tablet in New York, and Patrick and David are watching it on Patrick’s laptop in Schitt’s Creek, like a double date where only half the couples are dating and the date is occurring via text message across thousands of miles. 

When it’s over, Lou holds the tablet to her chest protectively while the credits roll. “Now I’m asking for your opinion, but please keep in mind that this is my most favorite movie, and even though we survived IKEA, we may not survive this if you hate it.”

“I don’t hate it,” Rachel says carefully.

“Ugh!” Lou hands the tablet back with unnecessary force.

“I told you, I just don’t like movies!”

“Yeah, but you also never watch movies. So I figured you just hadn’t seen enough of the right ones.”

“I think it's a chicken and egg situation. I would apologize but your best friend told me I shouldn’t apologize anymore when I’m not actually sorry.”

“Wow, okay.”

“You have one more chance,” Rachel says. Lou rolls her eyes and hoists herself off the couch. 

“I hate how much fun you’re having watching me struggle.”

“I think you’re having a little bit of fun too,” Rachel says, nudging her calf with her foot as she walks by.

Lou turns to glare at her, a smile tickling at the corners of her mouth. 

“Did Patrick like it?” she asks, nodding at Rachel’s phone on the side table. 

Rachel turns to look. “He says it was okay.”

Lou throws up her hands in defeat. “I give up!” 

“Aw. Maybe we should see a show or something instead of a movie. Maybe we’ll find more middle ground there. I’ve always wanted to go to a ballet at Lincoln Center.”

“Ballet?” Lou scowls.

“What?”

“I feel like I don’t know you at all. Is this the same girl who brought a frog into my cabin?”

“Well unlike that frog, you cannot put me in a box. Ballet is beautiful.”

“If you say so. I don’t really get the appeal of live performances.”

“What, like any live performances? Concerts? Theatre? Nothing?”

“Not really,” Lou shrugs. “I’ve been to a few but it’s just... not my thing I guess.”

“Not even... I don’t know. A singer you really like? How can you not like live performances?”

“How can _you_ not like movies?”

Rachel opens her mouth to respond and then closes it again. An idea forms, fragile and scary. She clings to it anyway. “Do I get a performance to change your mind?”

“Are you performing?” Lou asks, her eyes hot with challenge and maybe, just maybe, something else.

“No, that would not be the way to convince you. I get to pick one and you have to go with me. Just like the movies.”

“Fine. I will _try_ it but it should be noted that I have already tried a good number and variety in my day.”

“I just don’t get it. What is it you don’t like?”

“It’s expensive, and then you end up packed into a place with a bunch of strangers—”

“How is that different from your commute?.”

“I don’t like the commute either,” Lou says, which is fair. 

“Okay. I’m going to do some research and find some shows. Should be easy here, right?”

“Oh my god, just please don’t make me go to Manhattan.”

“I’m not a monster,” Rachel scoffs.

“I’m going to bed before you can try to convince me baseball is a worthwhile use of my time.”

“Oh no.” Rachel muffles her laugh with the blanket. “I love baseball.”

“Going!” Lou says. 

“Go!” Rachel agrees and pushes her just a little. Lou stops and turns at the door and for a second, Rachel thinks she’s going to say something. Or. Or do something. Rachel sucks in a breath and holds it. 

“Goodnight, Rachel.”

“‘Night, Lou.”

Rachel picks up her phone to plug it in for the night. There’s a message from Patrick.

_David is mad I didn't like the movie_

_So is Lou lol_

_Wait, mad at me or mad at you?_

_Both I think_

Patrick types for such a long time that Rachel starts to get nervous.

_I get why it’s funny. I do! I laughed at all the right places, even. But I guess... I don’t know. I know my parents wouldn’t send me away. I mean obviously, I’m already away. But they never would have sent me somewhere like that just to change me. Except they DID try to change me! Not like that but just all those little things they used to say about you and my job and sports and musicals and every fucking thing I ever did or wanted to do._

There’s a slight pause before another message comes through. _Sorry. Maybe me feeling weird about it is another sign from the universe that I should tell them, huh?_

Rachel types _Maybe you should_ and then deletes it. Patrick doesn’t need any more shoulds. _I don’t think there’s a deadline on stuff like this_

_Yeah. It’s just hard. I’m pretty sure they’ll be kind and accepting and say all the right things but. What if I tell them and then I still feel like they don’t really understand me, Rach?_

Rachel stares at the message for a long time before she replies. _Hot take: no one’s parents really understand them_

_Blasphemy!_

Rachel laughs out loud. They used to say that all the time to each other when one of them was particularly logical, obvious, or both. _Treason!_ she replies, the other half of the bit.

He sends a laughing emoji. There’s another long pause and then a quick _I miss you._

_Me too_

_I should sleep. I have to open the store at 9 tomorrow._

_Sleep well_

_You too!_

And then she remembers she wanted to ask if he would send her some of the Rose Apothecary lip balm, and they keep texting about everything and nothing for another twenty minutes before they finally say goodnight.

* * *

THE BROOKLYN Grange Butcher Paper Dinner is kind of a messy idea for a date but Mateo begs Lou to beg Rachel to get him two tickets. He’s overdue for a big romantic gesture, he says. Rachel may be connected to the source but she’s not _that_ connected. All of the summer’s events sold out before Rachel even started working there. Rachel asks Max and Willa about it on their regular morning walk-for-coffee break and they suggest she invite them to the more low-key staff version instead.

“You get to bring a guest but usually some staff can’t make it and there’s room for extras. You could probably bring a few people, if your roommate is interested.” The way Max says roommate tells Rachel she hasn’t been very subtle. 

Rachel reports back to Lou and Mateo with the staff alternative. “But I think it would be weird for me to third wheel your date,” she concludes. 

“Bring Lou.” Mateo gestures toward her with his fork. “Then she can keep you busy while I impress Drew.”

“I don’t think pulling my own pork is really my kind of thing,” Lou says. “I’m not that Brooklyn.”

“Technically, it’s in Queens,” Rachel says. Lou shoots her a look that says _remember how you’re new here?_ Rachel tries not to crack a smile.

“Louisa, if you love me, you will do this,” Mateo says. And she does love him, so she does.

Rachel introduces Lou and Mateo and Drew to her coworkers before they sit down at the long table in the middle of the rooftop farm.

“What is that ring you always wear, anyway?” Lou asks as Rachel loops it around her necklace to keep it from getting soiled by pulled pork.

“It was my mom’s. She got it when she lived in Brooklyn, actually, from a local silversmith. I didn’t used to wear it but I like having it on now that I’m here. Sort of like she’s with me.”

“I can see that.” Lou’s smile turns into a frown as she dons the optional gloves to pick apart her meal. 

“What about you?” Rachel asks.

“What about me?”

“What about you? What’s something from your family that’s special to you?”

“I thought Mateo and Drew were the ones on the date,” she says with a grin, which makes Rachel’s skin hot with embarrassment and what-ifs. They’re not on a date, of course, but it’s kind of fun to think about. Especially here, in front of her coworkers. Not a big coming out announcement or anything, but a big _this is me_ all the same. Coming forward. Coming into something new. 

“Yeah, no. Of course,” she mumbles. 

Lou nudges her with her foot under the table. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. Your heart is black and cold,” Rachel says, and that makes Lou laugh. 

“It’s just... I’m not that close with my family,” she whispers, and Rachel softens.

“Oh, Lou. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.” Rachel hesitates just for a moment before reaching a comforting hand to Lou’s arm. 

Lou’s answering look is sharp. “It was an innocent enough question. If I tell you, do you promise not to laugh?” 

“No,” Rachel says impishly. 

Lou glares at her but tells her anyway. “Not family-related, but I have a couple of floppy discs with all the files for the first game I ever designed. I keep them on my bookshelf in an archival-grade box.”

“Must be a good game,” Rachel says.

Lou shrugs. “I’m really proud of it. At the time, we didn’t really have touchscreen phones, which would have been a better device for it than the handheld gaming console I designed it for.”

“What is the premise? Or story? Sorry, I know nothing about video games.”

“It’s called Princess Marble. It’s kind of loosely about a princess who creates gems and is being held captive as a result. But there’s no savior. It’s not that kind of game. She has to free herself by putting together clues in a series of chambers. The puzzles get progressively more challenging but, really, the game itself is pretty simple.”

“It sounds cool. Kind of like an escape room. I love those.” Rachel remembers the annual Brewer Family escape room event with an unexpected fondness. 

“Kind of.” Lou bristles, obviously annoyed at the idea that her very original creation is like anything else. It’s sort of cute. 

“Then tell me about it.”

“I grew up playing an old Atari system because that’s what my step-sisters handed down. And when I started working in design, I held onto the principles of a lot of those games. The restriction of low resolution means the concept is really important. You can’t hide behind graphics. And the strategy has to work for different skill levels but within a really simple framework. Each successive level has to be attainable. You have to find a way to provide enough tastes of victory to keep players from getting bored. I wanted to make a game like that, abstracted yet simple, and use rendering and technology to make it feel modern and artistic and, well. Feminist, I guess.”

Rachel smiles, a little lost, a lot charmed. Lou never talks about her current job like this. 

“And now it lives forever on a floppy disc? Why didn’t you transfer it?”

“It’s too old. The platforms it’s designed for aren’t really in use anymore. Transferring the code alone would be a huge task without some advanced technology. I should send it somewhere, have it done. I just... haven’t.”

Rachel hears the rest of it too, the _besides, I can’t afford to right now_ even though Lou returns to her food without saying anything.

The meal is over by mid-afternoon. Mateo and Drew decide to get off the subway to walk it off in the West Village before going out for the evening, leaving Lou and Rachel to make the rest of the long ride home alone. 

“See you at work tomorrow,” Mateo says, hugging Lou. “And you,” he turns to Rachel, “are my new favorite. Thanks for making this happen. I owe you big time.”

“You’re welcome,” Rachel says, and even though she doesn’t normally like to keep a balance sheet, she files the IOU away for an idea that’s forming at the fringes of her mind. “I might hold you to that.”

“I like her,” he says to Lou, and then hugs her again before the train stops at Washington Square.

“Thanks for doing that for him,” Lou says, once they’re alone. 

“It was fun having you all.” Rachel tries to keep her voice easy. Since IKEA, this is the first time she and Lou have really ventured out just the two of them, without the pretense of take-out or any of Lou’s other friends to act as a buffer. Maybe they should walk, too, and elongate the afternoon. It just feels so good being with her, so effortless in a way it hasn’t been with anybody else.

“Want to get off at 7th Avenue and walk home through the park?” Lou asks as the train moves forward again. 

Rachel grabs the same center pole, the bottom of her fist stacking right on the top of Lou’s. The pole feels cool against Rachel’s palm, in contrast to the heat of Lou’s skin against her own, but she doesn’t let go, and neither does Lou. Rachel looks at her; the sweep of her dark hair hides one of her eyes but not the smile in them. “I’d like that,” Rachel says.

* * *

“I STILL can’t believe you two talked me into this,” Lou says, when they emerge from the 14th Street Station.

Rachel gives her a look. “I had nothing to do with it.”

“Rach is a baby queer. You have to take the girl to Cubbyhole,” Trina says.

“I’m her roommate, not her queer nightlife tour guide,” Lou says. “You two could have gone without me since you’re so eager.”

Trina gives Lou a pointed look. “How much longer until we get to the part of the night where you stop complaining and resign yourself to having fun?”

“However long it takes for at least two hot lesbians to buy me a shot.”

“C’mon, Rachel,” Trina says, leading the way. “I’ll get one, you get the other.”

 _I’m not a lesbian,_ Rachel almost says. Which, huh.

Rachel smiles the second they walk in the door and doesn’t stop. Inside, the ceiling is packed with colorful party decorations. It’s bright and eye-catching but underneath that, has an unexpected warmth. It’s sort of like what she imagines Alexis would be like as a bar. The aesthetic is all wrong for her, but still. She takes a picture and texts it to her because Alexis likes to see the new places she finds in New York. Alexis replies with a heart emoji. 

Rachel tries to scan the bar without staring. It's a blend of locals and tourists looking to beat the late crowd. It's kind of wild to imagine tourists coming here, seeking out queer spaces on vacation. It makes the world feel smaller again, but not in the suffocating way that it used to.

“See, look at that,” Trina says, pointing at Rachel with her beer bottle once they’ve gotten Lou her first round. “She loves it.”

Lou looks at Rachel, first to appease Trina, and then just because they do this sometimes. Look at each other. “Fine, we can stay,” Lou says. “But as soon as I have to push through people to get to the jukebox, we’re out of here.”

Trina lets herself be whisked away by someone she knows with an interesting haircut and a hot motorcycle jacket. 

“I might not be back,” she says with a wink at Rachel and a kiss to Lou’s cheek. Rachel watches them go and then notices Lou watching her watch. 

“What’s your type?” Lou asks.

“My type?”

“Yeah. Like who’s the prettiest girl you’ve ever seen? And not conventionally pretty, like need-to-know-more pretty.”

“Um,” Rachel stalls, because it would be too cheesy, and a lie, to say Lou. Lou is interesting, stunning even, but not really pretty. “I don’t know about type, but there’s this... She’s Patrick’s boyfriend’s sister.” Rachel resists the urge to bury her face in her hands, though she can feel it burning bright red.

“What does she look like?”

“Oh. Well you can google her. She used to be one of those Instagram people. Alexis Rose.”

“Okay, but I want to know what she looks like to you.”

“I don’t know. She has really soft hair and does that thing some girls do where they just touch you like it’s nothing. It’s hard to describe I guess. She’s always in motion. Always angling for something and just totally unashamed about it.”

“Is she queer?“

“No. I mean I don’t know.” Rachel is pretty sure what happened in the motel room was just a figment of her reeling, confused imagination. But she’s also done being sure about anything so. “We text sometimes. She’s dating a vet now. A guy.”

“Ah.” Lou says as she gets out her phone. 

“What are you doing?”

“Googling.” Lou looks through a few pictures of Alexis. It’s only because Rachel has been making a close study of Lou for the past few weeks that she notices her mouth tightening. 

“She’s very pretty.” Lou puts her phone away and looks around the bar. Then she gestures at a woman with a martini. “Ooh, what about her?”

She does kind of look like Alexis, actually, especially after a shot and half a vodka soda. Her hair is longer and straighter, but she has the hoop earrings and the skyscraper heels and the flowy patterned dress. There’s probably a name for that style. Probably a name Rachel would learn if she was dating someone like that.

“I didn’t come here to... I don’t know. Pick someone up,” Rachel says, trying to pump the brakes now that she sees where this is going. “I don’t even know how to like... label myself or whatever.”

“I see. And I get it. I do. It’s nice to know that what you are has a name. But what if it wasn’t a Very Serious Slog in search of the Right Label? What if it was just fun?”

“Fun? What’s that?” Rachel rolls her eyes at herself.

“Something you’re not very good at. Yet.” Lou smiles kindly and steps closer. 

“Neither are you,” Rachel points out. 

“Hm. And what can we do about that?”

Rachel considers laying it all on the table, because they’ve been working toward something. They have, haven’t they? But they’re interrupted by almost-Alexis who is definitely not Alexis up close. She is pretty though. She has a great smile. 

“Hey,” she says, flashing that full smile at Rachel. “I like your nails.”

Rachel looks down at her fingernails, clipped short and polished a light peach. They’re tidy but not exactly compliment-worthy. Lou elbows her.

“Um, thanks,” she says.

“I’m Lou. This is my roommate Rachel.”

“Hi. Sydney.” 

“Anyway I was just about to see where Trina disappeared to. You good to find your own way back?”

“Um, sure,” Rachel says, blushing and seething, gripping the edge of the bar like it’s the only thing keeping her above water. This was not the plan!

Lou’s smile wavers just a fraction and Rachel wants to reach out, touch the quiver of her lip with her thumb. Ask her what she really wants. Then Lou hugs her, which feels weird and kind of great. “Have fun, remember? Be safe,” she whispers, and then she’s gone.

Rachel considers just following Lou, pulling her out of the bar, maybe spinning around and kissing her. But if Lou wanted to kiss her she probably wouldn’t have left her here with not-at-all-Alexis. Sydney leans against the bar next to Rachel, half perched on one of the stools upholstered with Looney Toons characters. The ends of her hair tickle Rachel’s arm. She leans over when she speaks so her breath whispers across Rachel’s neck like a cooling breeze. It’s weird and wonderful and maybe a little wrong because she doesn’t smell like Lou’s toothpaste or the hint of jasmine in her moisturizer.

The song changes to something slow and romantic.

“Want to dance?” Sydney asks. Rachel looks around. No one else is dancing. _Have fun,_ Lou’s voice echoes in her head. 

“Okay,” she says, and lets Sydney pull her closer. In her arms, Sydney feels too tall, too pointy, too generous with her smile and too easy with her touch. Sydney kisses her when she isn’t expecting it, and it feels sort of awkward until she gets into it. Sydney tastes like lip balm and martini and it’s... It’s not at all like kissing Patrick or how she imagines kissing Lou. It’s like kissing a stranger. Well obviously it’s like kissing a stranger but it’s like kissing someone who intends to _stay_ a stranger, and that’s very different. But it is sort of fun.

Sydney smiles at her, and Rachel stops herself from blurting out that she’s never done that before, with a girl. It’s not like she’s never kissed a stranger in a bar. There were times when she and Patrick were on a break where she would go out with friends, find someone, take them home. But every time, no matter how it was, it never seemed to give her the clarity she was looking for. It left her feeling hollow. When Sydney asked her to dance, she thought maybe this would be different. But it’s not, really. Maybe Rachel just isn’t wired for strangers. Maybe there’s a label for that.

Sydney talks while they dance. She co-anchors the late Saturday news at NY1. She likes her job but she thinks she could do better in a smaller market. She asks Rachel a few questions too, and so she feels a little less like a stranger when she leans in and kisses her again.

“My place is only a few blocks from here if you want to come over,” she says, voice low in Rachel’s ear. “We can do whatever you want.”

This could really just be tonight. Just drinks even. Fun. Why doesn’t it sound like fun?

Rachel brushes her fingers over the little fabric-covered buttons on the back of Sydney’s dress, imagines slipping them through the holes one at a time in a dark room, the lights of the city shining on her long fall of hair. She wonders what it might be like. She could find out. Tonight. If she wants to. 

Does she want to find out?

Lou was wearing a black T-shirt and jeans with holes in the knees in protest to tonight’s plans. There would be no tease, taking it off her. No slow unbuttoning. Rachel would probably just pull it over her head. It might get stuck around her arms, holding her in place, and maybe then they would smile at each other and Rachel would kiss her while her arms were still suspended above her head before helping to free her. 

Rachel looks around the small bar. It’s getting crowded but Trina is easy to spot, still chatting with her friend at the front. Lou isn’t with her. 

“Everything okay?” Sydney asks gently, still waiting for an answer.

Everything is not okay. “I need to go,” she says, taking her hands off Sydney’s delicate buttons. She can find another stranger another night if she’s wrong about Lou. But she doesn’t think she’ll find another Lou. 

Sydney turns, her gaze puzzled. “Did I misinterpret something?” she asks. 

“No. You were—It’s just, I’m seeing someone. Or I want to be seeing someone. We haven’t talked about it. And I think if I’m going to talk to her about it, it will be better if I haven’t just—I’m sorry. You’re—”

Sydney puts up a hand to stop her frantic babbling. “It’s okay. I get it. The roommate?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“We’ve all seen the movie, babe.”

“Right. I’m really sorry,” Rachel says again, because even if she’s trying to apologize less, she is sorry for this. 

“Me too,” Sydney says.

“Well. Maybe I’ll see you around,” Rachel says, because that’s the kind of thing you say when you’re very freshly not from here. Sydney raises a delicately-sculpted eyebrow and Rachel apologizes again before she leaves to find Trina. 

“Have you seen Lou?”

Trina shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe she left with someone.”

So Rachel tries the source. _Hey. Where did you go?_

There’s no answer.

In the interest of time and better phone reception, Rachel decides to pay for a Lyft. In the backseat on the way to Brooklyn, she closes her eyes and tries to breathe. _Louisa Beckett, you had better be home._


	3. Chapter 3

“YOU’RE BACK already?” Lou asks when Rachel comes barging in.

“Yeah.” Rachel nods. “And so are you, I see. Thanks for letting me know.”

Lou tips her head, part amused, part wary. “I just got your text. I was in the shower. I thought you were off having fun.”

“Trying to. Yes. Thanks for the assist with that,” Rachel says. Now that Lou is here in front of her, she’s starting to lose her nerve. It’s one thing to know what she wants with Lou. It’s another thing entirely to tell her. What if they’re not on the same page?

“You’re... welcome?” Lou’s eyes narrow. Short of a bathroom tryst, there’s almost nothing Rachel could have done with Sydney and still made it home so quickly. 

“I bailed,” Rachel shrugs. 

“W-what?” Lou says. “Why?”

“I mean I had fun like you said. We danced. She kissed me. And then I sort of. Um. Told her that there was someone else. For some reason.”

“For some reason? You...” Lou’s mouth falls open and Rachel wants to kiss it, but she needs to say something first. 

“Just so we’re clear, you’re the ‘someone else.’”

“Oh we’re clear,” Lou says. Her smile splits open wide enough that Rachel can see her slightly crooked incisor.

“How was the kiss?” Lou asks, because she’s impossible. 

Rachel shrugs. “Nice.” A shy smile fights its way through. “I liked it.”

Lou’s smile turns soft and fond, two things it usually isn’t. Good thing too, because. God, Lou.

“I’m really nervous,” Rachel blurts. “I know how badly you need the rent and you’re my best friend here in New York and you’re the most interesting girl I’ve ever met and I know you’ve been burned and. I mean there are a thousand reasons why this is a bad idea. So we should... think about it. Or talk about it.”

“Okay. Let’s think about it.” She tugs on Rachel’s braid and then slips the band off the end. “Rachel, in one minute, I’m going to kiss you. And then I’m going to tell you good night. If that’s not something that sounds good to you, then tell me, and I won’t.”

Lou’s fingers unravel her braid so slowly, so carefully. The gentle tug makes her scalp tingle, makes her body tremble. The unwinding is a tease of what Lou’s hands can do to her. Rachel thinks of a dozen things to say, but they all cram together in her throat. And since none of them are _stop, I don’t want this_ , since all she can think is _I want you like I want to breathe_ , she doesn’t try to free them.

Lou combs her fingers through her loosened hair and brushes it back over her shoulders, watching Rachel with a knowing look in her bourbon-colored eyes. Rachel gets so lost in that look, in the sweep of her fingers in her hair, in the racing thudding of her heart, that she forgets there’s a ticking clock.

“Minute’s up,” Lou whispers, and Rachel surges forward to meet her lips.

Lou kisses her like she knows her. She anticipates the way her lips tip to one side when she's happy, the way her hands will reach for her hips. Everywhere Rachel wants her, there she is. It's so much more than nice.

They don’t stop at one kiss. Lou leans back and smiles, her hand still twisting Rachel’s hair around her fingers. Rachel blinks slowly and looks at her, at her eyes, her smile, the little stud in her nose. Rachel leans in and this time Lou comes faster, her hand combing through Rachel’s hair until she has her head between her palms, angling her, hands greedier, and then kissing her, kissing her, kissing her. 

Lou pushes back finally, breaths heavy, and smiles again. 

“I’m going to bed,” she says. 

“Me too,” Rachel says before Lou can invite her to join. She’s afraid if she crams all their firsts too closely together, she won’t remember the individual moments. She really wants to remember them. 

Lou turns toward her room and then turns back. She has that same look on her face that she did after the movies they watched, that nervous hope-you-liked-it sideways smile. Rachel cups her chin and kisses her once. Again. “Goodnight.”

* * *

“CONEY ISLAND.” Lou answers confidently when Rachel asks her where they should have an official first date. 

“Coney Island?” Rachel is baffled. “I thought you said I was on my own for all the tourist traps. Plus you hate crowds.”

“Okay yes, that is all true, but for this, I’ll make an exception.”

“Why do I feel like this is a test?”

“Are you saying it’s not on your not-so-super-secret list of touristy things you want to do but think I will roll my eyes at.”

“Of course it’s on my list.”

“Okay then.”

“I still don’t get it. What’s the catch?”

“My god.” Lou kisses her in exasperation. “There is no catch. If I take you to dinner I only get dinner. If I take you to Coney Island, I get the whole day with you.”

And for that, Rachel kisses her with no exasperation whatsoever. And then again, just because she can. “So you’re saying there is not a single ‘authentic New York experience,’” Rachel makes sure to use Lou’s exact tone, “that will give you an excuse to spend the whole day with me?”

“Rachel, let me take you to Coney Island or I’m going to find us a dark theater and we’ll spend the whole day watching movies.”

“The dark theater part sounds good,” Rachel says, stepping close and tracing her thumbs up and down the seams on the sides of Lou’s shirt.

“C’mon,” Lou groans. 

Rachel does want to go to Coney Island, the same way she wants to stand at the top of the Empire State Building and tour Ellis Island and walk across the Brooklyn Bridge and people watch in Central Park. She wants the journey to and from those places as much as she wants the places themselves. She wants to understand them spatially in relation to her home, to feel like she lives here, specifically, in New York City, instead of just somewhere that’s Not Home. 

But since Coney Island was technically Lou’s idea, Lou gets to take credit for how fun it is. It’s cheesy and colorful and crowded. They start at a pinball arcade and continue into Luna Park. They play carnival games and eat greasy hot dogs. They ride the Cyclone, which is the perfect excuse to laugh and scream and cling to each other. When their feet are back on the pavement, Rachel kisses Lou right there on the street in front of everyone, her stomach swooping like she’s still sailing over hills at sixty miles an hour. 

They walk the boardwalk and take pictures of the ocean and Rachel pulls up her jeans and dips her feet in the water. It’s chilly and salty and kind of smelly. 

“We studied the historic Coney Island amusement parks in school,” Rachel says, taking a few photos of the parachute jump. “The notion that parks could become active instead of passive places, that you could interact with them, started at places like this.”

“Huh,” Lou says, shielding her eyes from the sun as she looks up at the old faded red steel tower. “That’s exactly what we learned about home video games. Turning televisions and screens from passive to active entertainment.”

“I suppose it’s kind of similar, in a way. Did you always want to be a game designer?”

“From the minute I picked up an Atari joystick,” she says with a grin. “I don’t thrive in ‘traditional educational environments’ though, or at least that’s what my teachers always put in my report cards. I barely made it through university.”

“Yeah. I just wanted to dig in the dirt. Design school almost killed me.”

“At RISD we had to take a lot of classes with other art disciplines, which I’m grateful for now. It helps, actually, to know sort of how to draw figures and spaces and how to play with color. But at the time I remember those of us who mostly wanted to do the game programming would sit in the corners of the studios and pout about how we didn’t need to learn all of that.”

Rachel laughs at that. “We did that too, even with the stuff we knew we needed to know. It was such a big job, pretending like we were on top of everything.”

“I remember at Camp Woolsey you wanted to be a camp counselor for life, and if they wouldn’t let you, you would settle for park ranger.”

“Ha, yep.” Rachel smiles at her younger, opinionated self. “I got interested in conservation and how buildings interface with the city, how people interface with the city. And I love cities. Landscape architecture kind of found me, I guess. Thankfully I had a professor who knew how to direct that energy somewhere that fit.”

“I had a professor kind of like that too. Helped talk me out of quitting more than once. He was such a hard ass though. If he told you something was ‘pretty okay,’ that was high praise.”

“Ha, that sounds about right,” Rachel says. “You don’t strike me as someone who feeds off praise.”

“I don’t,” Lou says, surprised. “It doesn’t motivate me.”

“I remember that was one of the first things I ever noticed about you. You had this sort of inner fire. You didn’t care what people wanted from you.”

Lou is quiet for several steps, their feet falling softly on the wood of the boardwalk. “I kind of lost that for a while.”

“With your partner?”

“Yeah. Rachel, I don’t know if I will be good at this. I think you should... tread carefully, maybe. Protect yourself. Don’t, um. Don’t fall for me. Beware of Cupid’s arrow. Look before you leap. Et cetera.”

“Lou,” Rachel says, because it sounds better than _too late_. “I think you’ll be fine. And you know what, even if you’re not, I’m not fragile.”

“I know, but. I am.” Lou’s voice is a whisper, her eyes a soft plea, so Rachel reaches out and takes her hand. 

“Tell me about this,” Rachel asks, lifting their interwoven fingers and pointing to the tiny, blocky text tattooed on the inside of Lou’s middle finger. 

“It’s a line from the song ‘Come To My Window.’ It says, ‘What do they know about this love, anyway?’ Do you know it?”

“Of course. Melissa Etheridge.”

“Yeah.” Lou smiles. “I went to a concert of hers where she performed it. I remember standing there in the middle of this new group of queer kids I’d started hanging out with and we just wailed the whole song, but especially that part. I got the tattoo a week later.”

“You, Louisa Beckett, got a tattoo commemorating a memorable experience you had at a live show?”

She bites down on her smile. “It was the song more than the show.”

“Okay. What I’m hearing is that there’s hope I’ll find something you like.”

“A very, very slim chance. It’s, like, misery or a commemorative tattoo. There’s no middle ground.”

“I’ve already been doing some research,” Rachel says. “I’m excited.”

“Let’s have dinner,” Lou says, probably to change the subject. 

They do, at Totonno’s, a pizza place that Lou says is the only thing that makes coming all the way to Coney Island worth it. The crust is perfect and thin and crispy, the mozzarella homemade and bubbly. It’s the best pizza Rachel has ever had.

“Want to watch a movie?” Lou jokes when they get back. It’s past ten, and Rachel is tired from being on her feet and bombarded with fresh stimuli all day. 

“Maybe next time.” 

It’s been three days since they first kissed. They talked the next morning about taking things slow, and then Rachel made out with Lou against the front door for twenty minutes, making them both late to work. Rachel is supposed to say something when she wants to take it further. She wants to, but she also feels like she’s about to pass out from exhaustion. Her feet still aren’t used to the mileage here, to the long avenues and the sparsely available subway seats. 

“Maybe tomorrow we could stay in again. Watch whatever your third movie is,” Rachel says, pulling Lou closer. “Maybe, um. In bed.”

“I’d like that,” Lou says into a kiss. Their beds are twenty feet apart. It hardly matters which one.

“Me, too,” Rachel says and kisses her again. 

They get ready for bed in their shared bathroom, Lou making faces at Rachel around the buzzing head of her electric toothbrush, Rachel laughing. Lou is so goofy when they’re alone together. She loved seeing her that way today, outside of their apartment. 

Lou rinses out her toothbrush and towels off her hands and face. Catching Rachel’s eye in the mirror, she turns serious. “I’m going to bed,” she says, voice low as she brushes Rachel’s hair to the side to kiss the back of her neck. Her fingers are hot along the curve of Rachel’s shoulder through her thin sleep shirt. 

“Hey, Lou,” Rachel says, before Lou can disappear into her room. “Today was pretty okay.”

Lou laughs. “Agreed,” she says quietly, and then shuts the door. 

Rachel tries to count the nail holes around the ceiling of her room to help push her towards sleep, but her body still feels like it’s riding the Cyclone, swooping up and down and around the curves. If she closes her eyes, she’s right back there, Lou gripping her hand so tightly, her rings digging into Rachel’s fingers. She can still hear the way Lou’s delighted laugh would devolve into a shrill shriek as they plunged down another hill, and then returned to uncontrollable laughter and relief and joy when they started up again. She desperately wants to see if she lets loose like that when it’s just the two of them.

Suddenly, Rachel doesn’t want to wait until tomorrow to find out.

She changes her underwear quickly into something a little nicer and knocks on Lou’s door when she sees the thin sliver of lamplight underneath it. 

“Rach?” Lou asks. 

“Yeah, hey. Um. I just thought. Maybe we could... ”

Lou gets up and walks over to her, still smelling like mint from her toothpaste.

“Maybe we could what?” she asks. 

Rachel fumbles for words, euphemisms, and then throws them all out. This is dumb. It’s Lou. She’s hot and funny and just spent the day with Rachel at Coney Fucking Island because it’s on Rachel’s list. Rachel isn’t shy. She knows what she wants. “I want to have sex with you. I know it’s late, and seriously, you can say no, but—”

Lou cuts her off with a kiss, and then she’s backing up toward the bed and Rachel is following like they’re still on the Cyclone, holding tightly to each other, and she simply can’t let go. 

They shed their pajamas as they go, and then Lou’s hands are everywhere. 

“Where should we start?” Rachel asks, the pad of her thumb brushing along the curve of Lou’s breast and across the Brooklyn street grid tattoo sleeve, following the streets around her arm.

Lou inspects her fingers and then says, confidently, “Hands.”

“Oh. Yeah, okay,” Rachel says.

“Something wrong?” Lou asks, an eyebrow raised. 

“It’s just. I can do it myself with my hands.”

Lou lowers herself over Rachel and kisses her. “Not like this,” she murmurs against her lips. 

She’s right.

* * *

LOU EYES the tickets like they might turn into a gaping, toothy mouth and chew her up. “The Frog Prince? Is this a joke?”

“I mean, yes. Because you said the thing about me liking frogs and ballet. But also it’s a real show. That we’re going to. According to our agreement that you would come to a live show with me.”

“Okay, but that agreement was made before we started dating, and now that we are dating aren’t there so many better things we can be doing with our nights?” Lou kisses her jaw, her neck, the soft skin below her ear, the curve where her shoulder meets her neck.

“We watched _Mad Max: Fury Road_ after we started dating, per the previous agreement.”

Lou shakes her head. “I still can’t believe _that’s_ the one you liked best.”

“Are you kidding?” Rachel shrugs. “I mean I would have to watch it again to really catch everything that’s happening. But I sort of loved it anyway. It’s bizarre and wonderful.”

“God, I hope you’re better at picking live performances suited to my tastes than I am at picking movies suited to yours.”

“I have a good feeling about this,” Rachel says. 

Rachel has an even better feeling when Lou emerges from her room wearing a silvery black dress that shows off her shoulders and neck.

“Wow,” Rachel says, taking her in.

“You too,” Lou says. 

“Thank you,” Rachel says, and spins. When she stops, Lou is standing close enough to kiss her, and then she is kissing her. “You’re messing up your lipstick.”

“Am I?” Lou asks with a shrug. "You sure you don’t want to stay in?”

“I’m sure,” Rachel says. "What?"

"You stole," Lou pauses to reach for a tissue and wipe at Rachel's mouth, "some of my lipstick."

And Rachel keeps thinking about that most of the way to the theater, her smile blooming from somewhere deep within. 

When they find their seats, Lou takes a program and looks it over. “This says lesbian princess,” she says, pointing to the list of performers. 

“Yeah. This company, Ballez, is ballet but with what I think you would call a ‘fuck the white, cishetero patriarchy kind of vibe.’” Rachel hands over her own program, open to the mission statement.

“So, like ballet but make it queer?”

“More like ballet but stop pretending that it’s not queer.”

“Huh,” Lou says, and then she’s looking at Rachel with new appreciation.

“What?”

“Nothing. It’s just... I think maybe you know me better than I thought you did.”

Rachel isn’t sure if that’s a good or a bad thing just yet. “Remember when you convinced me to play Yar’s Revenge with you? You said it always feels attainable, like you can get better and beat it. And when you lose, you can find your mistake. That it dangles that next level so close that it always feels like one more try and you'll make it, no matter how many times you lose.”

“Sure. What does that have to do with ballet?”

“Nothing. It’s just, I think that’s what relationships have always been for me. With Patrick, it always seemed like the next level was right there. Like if we just tried one more time, we would have it. I used to watch him, watch us. Make strategies. It felt like if I just concentrated hard enough, I could win it for both of us.”

“Rach.” Lou takes her hand and kisses it, then warms it between her own. 

“So, anyway, I feel like I’m still on watch sometimes. I don’t want to do that with you. I don’t want to always be on the lookout for problems to solve, you know? But it’s a hard habit to break.”

Lou’s fingers tickle the underside of Rachel’s wrist as she ponders that. “Well. I think you’re great. Bad habits and all.”

Mercifully, the house lights dim to hide the pink racing up Rachel’s face. The performance is funny and sensual. The lead is thick-legged and so powerful. Whatever she’s feeling in the moment expands until it fills the room. And when she dances, you can’t take your eyes off her. 

They stand and applaud at the end, and then Lou kisses the nape of Rachel’s neck while they wait to leave their row. “For the record,” she murmurs into Rachel’s ear, “if this _were_ a game, you definitely just leveled up.”

* * *

LOU IS different from anyone Rachel has ever been with, obviously, but it doesn't matter in any of the ways she was expecting. It matters in different ways, in the way she kisses her after they’ve both come a few times, in the way she laughs before, during, and after like she’s having so much fun, in all the ways that Rachel is having fun, too. They can both be kind of serious. Intense, even. But together, in bed, it’s like all of that gets shed with their clothes. Skin to skin, Rachel finds it easy to let go. 

Often, Lou takes her time. Not always. Sometimes it’s frantic and needy and pushy and hot. Before, sex seemed like a code that had to be cracked. There was knowledge to acquire. Skills to master. Practice to make it perfect. There’s still some of that, practically speaking, but it doesn’t _feel_ the same. It doesn’t feel like a problem to solve or a service to perform. It feels like a person to enjoy.

Lou sees that Rachel is getting close, her mouth warm and wet between Rachel’s legs and her eyes warmer when she glances up, following the path of her own hand, palm heavy on Rachel’s skin. She keeps going until Rachel comes again, and fuck, _fuck_. It comes from outside in, from Lou's fingertips dancing up her sides and the slide of Lou's tongue, and inside out, from this place deep within her that's finally, joyously letting go, giving in.

“Lou. Fuck.”

Lou finishes with kisses to her thigh, with hands steady on her hips, with a self-satisfied smile. 

“Wanna go again?” Lou asks on her way back up, kissing her breastbone fondly.

“Oh my god.” 

Lou laughs, her breath soft along the curve of Rachel’s waist while she traces a vein inside of Rachel’s hip bone. When Lou touches her like this, like she just needs that tiny bit more contact, it makes Rachel’s body ache for her.

“I was wondering. Do you have any toys?” Lou asks. 

“Oh my god,” Rachel says again. She drapes an arm across her face and tries to catch her breath. “Yeah. There’s a red box under the bed.”

Lou drops to the floor and finds the box. 

“New or old?” Lou asks, holding up a strap-on harness. 

“Old. I used to peg Patrick sometimes. I threw out the dildo, though.”

“Oh my god,” Lou says, licking her lips, and this time Rachel laughs. “I have to stop underestimating you.”

“It’s probably not what you’re thinking. I would love to try that with you sometime, but with him it just wasn’t...” Rachel doesn’t know what it wasn’t. It wasn’t this. It’s hard to get excited about something that never felt right. Even though she knows the difference now, between sex where the goal is to make someone come, instead of finding a way to meet each other. 

She hates that she has hang-ups about things like this. She hates that everything in the box was purchased either in service of making it better for him, or in service to herself, alone, when she couldn’t face the emotional labor of making it better for him.

“We never have to try it,” Lou says. “You know that right?”

No, she didn’t know that. “Are you sure?”

In answer, Lou smiles and kisses her belly, a big, smacking, silly kiss.

“Do you have toys?” Rachel asks.

“Would you like the tour?” Lou jokes.

“Yes. Very much.” 

Lou’s tour of her drawer of toys is not that different from the way she shows Rachel around the neighborhood. Except that it’s unbelievably hot the way she picks them up and tells her, casually, what she likes in each one, what kind of mood they’re good for, whether she prefers them solo or with help. 

“This is my go-to when I want the feeling of being eaten out without the hassle of finding someone to do it,” Lou says, holding up a small purple bulb-shaped vibrator with a clit massager on one end. 

“Or when the person you’re dating isn’t very good at it yet.” She’s not great at it because she doesn’t really like it, which Lou knows. But she doesn’t need to remind her.

Lou presses their hands together, and then moves hers, stroking her fingertips up and down Rachel’s palm, in between her fingers. It helps ease Rachel’s anxiety. “It’s okay that there are some things you don’t like.”

Rachel wants to like it. And she’ll probably like it a lot more if she feels like she’s good at it. But she gives herself the gift of not promising either of them that that will happen. She’s been crushed by broken promises in bed more than once.

“May I?” Rachel asks, taking the toy. She used to have one a lot like this.

Lou nods enthusiastically and picks through a couple of lubes before handing one to Rachel. 

Rachel sets it aside and kisses her stomach, kisses above her clit, kisses the stretch marks on her thighs and the dark dusting of freckles inside her knee. 

“Which game is this again?” Rachel asks, following the tattooed line of blocky, pixelated figures advancing up her thigh. 

“Space Invaders.”

“Are they invading you?” Rachel asks, charmed.

“No. That was my first tattoo. I got it with a fake ID and I was just thinking ‘put it somewhere my mom won’t see it.’”

“Sneaky,” Rachel says, and then kisses one of the weird little aliens.

“I never thought of it that way, though. Alien invasion could be fun. Assuming consent of course.”

“I think the consent kind of cancels out the invasion. But I could wear a couple of cardboard boxes and slowly move towards you in a side-to-side fashion.”

Lou laughs and hands Rachel the lube. “If you’re stalling, fine. I want you to be comfortable. But if you’re trolling, cut it out and get on with it.”

“Get on with it,” Rachel mutters as she pours the lube in her hand. “No appreciation for dirty talk.”

“Is that what you’re doing?” Lou is laughing harder now. 

Just for that, she takes her time spreading the lube on while she kisses Lou’s breasts, takes her nipples in her mouth. This, she likes a whole lot. She likes the way they feel against her tongue, the way Lou’s breathing changes now that Rachel knows exactly what she likes, the way little goosebumps raise among her freckles in the wake of Rachel’s lips. Likes that whenever she checks in with a quick glance, Lou looks so fucking satisfied by it. 

Lou starts to tell her what she thinks about when she’s using the toy alone, what gets her off. The ways she likes to be touched. The ways she touches herself. It’s so much, imagining it while pressed against Lou’s skin in the low light of the lamp. Rachel finds herself trying the things Lou is describing, and has to press her own palm against herself a few times. 

“I thought about you, the last time,” Lou says, brushing Rachel’s hair back with her hands. “About how your lips feel on me. Your tongue. I came so fucking hard, Rach.”

Lou’s breaths are getting ragged, her words spaced out between them. Rachel pulls away to let her catch her train of thought again.

“For the record,” Lou adds following her, “that was dirty talk.”

“Should I have taken notes?” Rachel says. 

“Oh my god. Come here,” Lou says, but she comes to get her, sitting up and twisting her hand in Rachel’s hair to pull her back down. Lou’s tongue slides against hers until they’re both grabbing at sheets and hips and shoulders. 

Rachel pauses to lubricate the toy and then turns it on and presses it against her clit. Lou drops her thighs open for Rachel’s hand, a silent plea for more, and Rachel gives it to her. 

“Jesus, Lou. Look at you.” Rachel can’t stop looking at her, the heave of her chest rising as her breaths speed up, her half-lidded eyes dark and desperate. 

Rachel bends over to kiss her again. She lets it build, lets herself watch in between slow kisses. Lou’s foot wraps around the back of Rachel’s leg, her toes pointed and their calves flexed together, and Rachel knows she’s so close. 

“Don’t stop,” Lou gasps, her hair a dark mass of almost-curls. Watching Lou come is insanely hot. It’s crazy how different it is, how deeply different it is, when she’s not weighed down with the responsibility, the expectation, of making it happen. Fun, Lou always says. And yeah, it is.

When she’s starting to regain normal breathing, Lou pushes the toy away and kisses Rachel soundly. “Come here.” Another kiss. “Rach.” And another. “Rachel.”

Rachel kisses her back, skates her fingertips down her side, smiling when she giggles at the teasing tickle. 

“I don’t think I want to have sex with men anymore.” 

Rachel doesn’t realize she said it out loud until Lou props up her head on an elbow and asks, “Care to elaborate? Or is this dirty talk too?” 

“Oh, god. Sorry. No. Talking out loud when I shouldn’t be.”

“No, please. By all means.” Lou’s tone is sarcastic but her eyes aren’t. Rachel knows she’s allowed to take it genuinely if she wants. “I’m glad my orgasm was revelatory.”

Rachel laughs. “Sorry. It’s not important.”

“Sure it is. But it’s also—” Lou turns to look at the clock. “—really late.”

“Yeah. Can you call yourself bi if you’re attracted to men in theory but are kind of sick of them in practice?”

Lou laughs at that, a full rolling, shoulder-shaking laugh, and kisses Rachel again. “You can call yourself whatever you want.”

“What if I just call myself your girlfriend for now and leave it at that?” 

Lou’s laughter vanishes. It’s replaced by a small, shy smile. “That one sounds like it fits.”

“Yeah.” Rachel kisses her again before burrowing by her side. “It does.”

* * *

AS SHE’S getting ready to leave for the night, Rachel realizes she nearly missed Patrick’s birthday and sends him a string of celebration emojis and a text.

Lou’s friends are here, and she is impersonating a grumpy half-elf, which means Rachel is planning to get drinks at Montero’s with some friends from work who are quickly losing the “from work” qualifier. 

“Damn, Rach,” Trina says when she emerges through the French doors, eyeing Rachel with appreciation. 

“Rach! Come play! I can work you in,” Trev calls as she walks through the kitchen toward the front door. 

“Nope. I’m not falling for that again.” She points an accusatory finger at Trev and turns to Lou. “I’ll see you later.”

Lou tips her head back and kisses her once. Then again. 

“You look good. Have fun,” she says, but the look in her eyes is a heated _save some of the fun for me_.

Once she gives directions to the Lyft driver, she looks at her phone to check Patrick’s reply.  
_Thanks_  
_My parents came up. They found out about David._

_They found out? Or you told them?_

_Sort of both? I still have to get to the bottom of it._

_Uh oh. Hugs!_

_Thanks. gtg_

Rachel waits a full forty-eight hours before she calls him for the details. They talk for an hour, and when he tells her the whole story, the big hole he dug for himself, the way David reached a hand in and pulled him out, even though he was hurting, all Rachel can say is, “Oh, Patrick.”

“I know.”

“But at least now they know you’re gay. Is that—Do you use gay?” 

Sometimes talking to Patrick about stuff like this is sort of like the blind leading the blind, but sometimes it’s comforting to talk to someone who had to start over at thirty.

“Yeah. I used to worry that it diminished what we had, but I was still gay back when we were together. It helps... I don’t know. Contextualize things? When I think about it that way.”

Which is it exactly. “Yeah.”

She can still feel the tickle on her scalp as Lou’s fingers unwound her braid before she kissed her. It was that moment before the kiss, even more than the kiss itself, that shifted something into place. She didn’t become someone else, she learned something about who she’s always been.

“Patrick.” Rachel pauses. She knows she probably won’t get a satisfying answer to this question but she still needs to ask it. “Why didn’t you tell David about me?”

He blows out a breath, muffled against the phone, and she can practically see him scratching nervously at the back of his neck. “David has a bad history. With relationships. And I was worried if we got too far into it, he wouldn’t trust me.”

Rachel doesn’t point out the disconnect of trying to earn someone’s trust by omitting big parts of your life. God, it’s nice to be with someone who knows how to talk about hard things. “I felt so embarrassed, showing up there like some big romantic gesture, and you were already dating again, and he didn’t even know about me.” She’s not trying to make him feel bad. She’s really not. But she needs him to know the truth now that she can trust it won’t break them. 

“I’ve actually been thinking about you a lot recently. About the things I wish I’d done differently.”

“Oh? Like what?” she fishes, joking and not.

“Well I wish I hadn’t asked you to marry me. Not that I didn’t mean it at the time, just that... you should only get proposed to once, by someone who can give you everything you’re looking for. I’m sorry I took that from you. And from me.”

He does this sometimes, says things that remind her why she was so desperately in love with him, despite everything. And it answers the question that she’s been too scared to ask, about whether she mattered. 

“You know what I think about when I think about that day?” Rachel asks. “I think about how amazing it is that we get second and third and fourth chances sometimes.”

Patrick is quiet for a long time. “Blasphemy,” he says, but it’s choked off. 

She smiles. “Treason.”

“I’m going to ask David,” he says, almost a whisper. “I told my parents too, so I wanted you to hear it from me.”

“That’s so great, Patrick,” she says, and the static of his silence sounds like all the things, past and present, that always swirl between them. 

“Anyway, I have to get back to work,” he says. “But as always, it’s good to talk to you.”

“Same,” she says. “On both counts. And good luck with the big ask,” Rachel adds before they hang up, and means it with her whole heart. Which is a really, really good feeling.

* * *

RACHEL STANDS in the doorway and smiles at Lou, frowning and hunched in front of her computer ten minutes after they’re supposed to leave for the farmer’s market in Prospect Park. Lou is so intent on whatever she’s doing that she doesn’t notice Rachel coming closer until she’s crawling in her lap. 

“Can I help you?” Lou asks, but she doesn’t look like she minds Rachel straddling her as she tips her head back to accept a kiss. 

Rachel pushes their noses together. “It’s a beautiful summer day. You’re frowning at your computer when you’re supposed to be outside with me, frowning at the sun for having the audacity to shine and at other people for deciding to enjoy it.”

“I’m almost ready, I promise.”

“That’s what you said an hour ago. If we don’t get there soon, Omar will sell out of the good tomatoes and I’ll have to pay double for them at Whole Foods.”

“Don’t you get the produce that doesn’t sell from work?”

“Yes, but a reliably good tomato is hard to come by and Omar has unlocked the mystery of the _solanum lycopersicum_.”

“Fine. If you’ll stop using Latin we’ll go get you your tomatoes,” Lou says, standing up, still holding Rachel’s hips.

TOMATOES IN hand, Rachel eyes Lou’s full coverage as they spread out a blanket in the sun on Prospect Park’s Long Meadow. They also managed to snag some of Omar’s rhubarb, which Rachel promises to turn into a foolproof crisp in exchange for them walking around with a bunch of leaves sticking out of the bag for the rest of the day. “Aren’t you hot?” Rachel asks, sitting on the blanket next to her.

“Aren’t I?” Lou says, grinning behind her sunglasses.

“Here.” Rachel hands her the wrapped sandwich from their backpack. “One bacon, egg, and cheese for you, and one for me.”

“You’re going to love it.”

“It does smell really good.” It tastes really good too. 

They’ve been dating for six months now, and Saturdays in Prospect Park have become part of their routine. Sometimes they explore, and sometimes they just sit, Rachel in a tank top and shorts, Lou in full long sleeves and pants. Which means later, Rachel is always sunburnt, and Lou is always gloating while she helps spread aloe on her shoulders. Rachel is pretty sure she’s in love.

Today is not like every other Saturday, though. Rachel has a surprise. And she’s really, really anxious about it. 

Lou picks up on it, because of course she does. “You keep squirming. What’s up?”

“I have something for you. And I was planning to give it to you today but now I’m nervous.”

“Okay well you can’t say that and then not give it to me. I’m sure I’ll love it.”

“It’s just that now that I’m thinking about it again I feel like maybe I crossed some kind of boundary and we haven’t been together that long and what if, like, this is the thing that ruins it.”

“Did you get me a puppy or something?” Lou asks, amused.

“No. Nothing like that.”

“Rachel.” Lou scoots closer and cups Rachel’s chin. “Give me my present.”

Rachel closes her eyes and blows out a breath. “Fine. Here.”

Rachel hands Lou her phone, which confuses her more. “Open the app in the top right corner.”

Lou looks at it and then up at Rachel, her mouth fallen open.

“It’s Princess Marble.” 

“Yeah. I asked Mateo if he could help convert the files and turn it into an app. Right now it’s a beta version, and he gave me a whole list of things to say about how it was set up, something about archives and a test, um, flight—”

“TestFlight. It’s a distribution method that—”

Rachel waves her hand. “As long as you understand it that’s all that matters. Anyway the point is it’s really fun, Lou. I’ve been playing it a little the last two days. And if you want, you could start selling it or figure out how ads work—I don’t know, you’re the one who does this stuff—or just keep it for yourself. But I wanted it to be something you could play, and show people if you want, and not just leave in a box of floppy discs.”

Lou just kind of stares at Rachel, and then she taps the phone and opens the app. Lou plays for a minute, the only sound coming from the game soundtrack through the phone. 

“You kept the music.”

“You said music is an essential artistic component of games.” 

Lou is still playing, still not really saying anything, and Rachel continues to worry she really messed up. 

“Lou, I—”

Lou looks up with tears in her eyes and a huge smile on her face and then she’s chucking the phone to the blanket and bowling Rachel over as she kisses her wherever she can make contact. 

Rachel laughs and takes Lou’s face in her hands to help the kisses land where she wants. She wraps her arms around Lou’s compact, soft frame and squeezes her close.

“So you like it?” Rachel asks. 

“I love it. Thank you.”

“I told Mateo I wasn’t going to remember half the stuff he said so you’re supposed to call him for the details about the setup and how to release it if you want.”

“Okay. I’ll talk to him at work tomorrow. How did you even come up with this?”

“I just...” Rachel pauses to tuck Lou’s hair behind her ear, to trace the soft ridge of her cheekbone with her thumb. “I think you’re amazing, Lou. And I remember how you looked when you were telling me about that game, and how proud of it you were. I wanted to find a way to show you that you’ve still got it.”

“Rach. God.” Lou shakes her head and blinks the tears away.

 _I love you,_ Rachel thinks, and manages not to say it. That is a gift that Lou might not appreciate. “I’m glad you like it.”

“C’mon,” Lou says, getting up. “I actually have something for you too.”

They walk back through the market and Lou stops at a florist stand near the center to pick up something she already paid for. The florist hands her a bundle of sprigs of lavender with thin, curling leaves offset by sharp purple violets. 

“I... here,” Lou says, still trying to gather her emotions.

“What’s this?” Rachel asks.

“We just. I just. Wanted to? I wanted to.” Lou is adorably flustered at having to explain herself even that much, so Rachel takes the flowers and kisses her and lets Lou pull her by the hand.

“Where are we going?” Rachel asks. 

“I’m taking you home.”

“Oh. And what are we going to do there?”

“I’ll tell you on the way and you can decide if you’re up to it.”

Lou holds her hand while they walk, keeping Rachel close, and tells her in excruciating detail what she’d like to do, starting with where she wants to touch her, how she wants to kiss her, and ending—or just getting started, depending on how Rachel’s feeling—with Rachel sitting on her face. 

By the time they close the apartment door behind them and get the produce and flowers situated, Rachel is tugging at Lou’s sweater and pulling her towards her room. 

“Any revisions before we get started?” Lou asks, pulling Rachel close again. 

“No, none.”

“Okay. Take off your clothes and get on the bed.”

* * *

RACHEL PLANS to spend the day at the Cloisters alone. Lou has to work and Rachel hopes to spend an unsocial amount of time studying the gardens that are reconstructed based on medieval art, herbals, and other first hand accounts. Rachel never would have planned something like this alone before. Never would have made plans at all that didn’t involve Patrick or their friends or family.

So she’s surprised and a little hesitant when Lou surfaces from behind her multiple monitors to get a glass of water and asks if she can come along.

“Sure. But there is to be no commentary along the lines of ‘oh look, another flower.’”

“I would never,” she says. 

“There is to be no checking of watches. No grumbling of stomachs. No attempts to pull me off into an empty gallery unless it’s to look at art.”

“I don’t wear a watch. And I can’t control my stomach.”

“Your phone then. And bring a snack.”

“They probably don’t allow outside food.”

“Eat one on the way.”

“I have to say, Rach, I’m never not impressed by how seriously you take your fun.”

“Thank you,” Rachel says, determined to take it as a compliment. 

“Just let me change into real pants and grab my snack.”

Rachel packs a few extras—Lou’s headphones and book and an extra bottle of water—and they manage to catch the train just before the doors close. 

During the hour-long ride, Lou accepts the headphones from Rachel with a soft smile. She opens the copy of Princess Marble she now has on her own phone.

“What level are you on?” Rachel asks, looking up from her book.

“223. It’s starting to get a lot harder.”

“You should talk to the developer about that.”

“We’ve had a few strongly-worded conversations,” Lou mutters as she loses the level.

Rachel closes her book and rests her head on Lou’s shoulder to watch her try again, and again, as Lou plays it the rest of the way there.

RACHEL PULLS her phone out again when they reach the Cloisters to snap a few pictures. There’s a message waiting from Patrick. _We set a date. Sept 3_

_THIS Sept 3?!_

_Yep_

_It’s July 12. Are you pregnant?_

_LOL_  
_I know it’s last minute, but I would love to have you there_

_I’ll try!_

Rachel looks up at Lou, who is buying their admission tickets. 

_Can I bring a plus-one?_

_Of course!_

They wander the museum together until Rachel wants to park in the Cuxa Cloister and do some plant identification and sketching. Lou goes off on her own and then comes back and settles across from Rachel on the wide stone ledge between pink marble columns. Rachel isn’t great at drawing people, but she tries to capture the way Lou looks, relaxed and happy against the column, her book forgotten in her lap. 

“I know you’re not drawing me after I promised to sit here while you did landscape designer things and not complain.”

“You give it a sense of scale.”

Lou reaches for the sketchbook and Rachel hands it over nervously. Maybe she should have asked permission first.

“It’s just a drawing of my face.” Lou hands the book back to Rachel without any further comment, but her mouth is fighting a smile, which makes Rachel smile too.

A few minutes, and some more sketching, later, Rachel asks, “What made you decide to tag along?”

“Short answer or long?”

“Both, obviously.”

Lou’s smile widens. “The short answer is I’m trying to be a better girlfriend. The long answer is I like seeing the city with you. Even the tourist stuff. Even places I’ve already been, or didn’t like before. You remind me that things can change. I can change.”

“Hmm. Well I don’t mind you as a girlfriend,” Rachel says, impishly. 

“Be still my heart,” Lou laughs. Then her face turns serious again. “I just... I feel like you do nice gestures and gifts and stuff. I’m not good at that.”

“So? You’re good at other stuff.”

“I know.” Lou shakes her shoulders like she is trying to dump a weight from them.

“Lou, this might sound ironic since you’ve decided to tag along on my day here, but no one has ever given me space like you do. I always felt like if I didn’t fit inside Patrick, we wouldn’t work. I never feel like that with you. I get to be myself. And I don’t just mean queer. I get to figure out what kind of designer, and daughter, and friend, and girlfriend I want to be. That’s a huge gift.”

“Yeah,” Lou says, nodding. “It’s—That’s important to me. So. Good.”

“Good.”

They’re silent for a few more minutes, but Rachel looks up occasionally and smiles at her, and sometimes catches her doing the same. 

“So, not to blatantly ignore all those nice things you said about how I give you space, but do you want to tell me what’s bugging you?”

Rachel loves her so much. 

“Patrick is getting married.” 

“And that’s... bad?” Lou asks, cautiously. 

“No. I’m happy for him,” Rachel answers quickly. “One hundred percent. He told me he was going to propose. It’s just... I don’t know. It’s weird. It’s weird to think about going back there.”

“You don’t have to go. Not unless you want to.”

“Yeah.” Rachel does want to go. She wants to see Marcy and Clint and Patrick and his cousins, people who made up her extended family for years. She doesn’t know if Lou would want to come, or if she’ll be able to so last-minute, but she loves the idea of that, too. Of saying, _me too. I found what we were missing all those years._

Rachel returns to sketching, and Lou watches her for a few minutes before she returns to her book. 

Rachel saw a sign in one of the galleries about how cloisters were spaces for meditation and learning in monasteries. She can see why. It’s easy to focus here, equal parts limited and inspired by the arcades on the four sides, the distractions narrowed down to this small patch of stone and open sky above her, and the garden providing the deeper peace that nature always seems to bring her. 

She _is_ happy for Patrick, and she’s so glad they’re friends again, but it’s still a little hard to imagine watching him marry someone else. It feels like it’s all happening so fast.

When Patrick asked her to marry him, they were on a road trip visiting her brother in Montreal. He’d made a playlist and cued it up when they left home, each song representing one of their firsts. He pulled off the highway to a park along the Ottawa River just as ‘their’ song _Still The One_ , finished playing. They went for a walk to stretch their legs, talking over the sound of their footsteps crunching on the gravel path, about how nice the day was, how nice the drive had been, how nice it was to be together again, now that they were together again.

When he asked her, he opened a small blue box with his grandma’s ring. She said yes immediately. He was adorable and nervous and relieved and happy. They were happy. 

For the rest of the drive to Montreal, they talked about the wedding. How big it would be, the colors they would have, flowers, music, where to would have it, when. Patrick started to squirm in his seat and said they didn’t have to figure it all out right away. Couldn’t they just enjoy being engaged for a little while?

“Let’s pick a date at least,” she said. So they did. Or she did. 

Sometimes, when she looks back, there are a lot of ways she might have seen it coming, if she’d been paying attention. But that day he smiled and squeezed her hand when his phone buzzed with the alert from their shared calendar, and he kissed her at the stoplight as they pulled off the highway, and he fucked her that night, the two of them laughing and shushing each other and trying not to make a mess of her brother’s couch. Until Schitt’s Creek, she counted that night as one of the good ones. 

The thing is, even if she’s not entirely comfortable, Rachel wants to go. She wants to support him, yes, but more she wants to celebrate with him. She wants to celebrate who they could have become, and celebrate that they chose not to.

Rachel nudges Lou with her foot and tries out her best, most convincing smile. “So if I _do_ go to the wedding, I think it would be easier if I had a friend with me.”

“Rachel, would you like me to go with you?” Lou abandons her book for real, folding down the page corner before closing it. 

“Wow, that was easier than I thought. Yes, would you? That would be amazing.”

Lou rolls her eyes. “I hope it says something about my feelings for you that I hate parties, crowds, weddings, small towns, and airports, and I’m still offering to go.”

Rachel feels warm from her toes to the ends of her bangs, finally grown out enough to tie back with the rest of her hair. Then she remembers the way she hinted for the proposal, pushed Patrick to set a date.

“Do you think I’m too pushy sometimes?”

“Yes, absolutely.” Rachel shoves her gently in protest. “See!”

“You know what I mean.”

“You are,” Lou says. “But you mean it in a bad way, and I don’t. I can push back when I want to.”

She can and she does. “I made him pick a wedding day right after we got engaged. October 28th.” _The first day of the rest of our lives_ , she’d called the calendar appointment, so fucking sure of herself. Of _them_. Of everything she thought their marriage would be.

“Wait, October 28th is the day you moved here,” Lou says. 

“Yeah.” She leans over and kisses Lou, closing her eyes at the soft welcome of her lips. “It was also the first day I came out to anyone. The first day of the rest of my life.”


	4. Chapter 4

RACHEL’S CAREFUL planning goes to shit less than two hours after takeoff when the fight attendant makes an announcement that the plane will be making an unscheduled stop in Sudbury for a necessary pilot change.

“Larry Air doesn’t even sound like a real airline,” Lou says, gripping the arm rest. “What kind of airline suggests you bring your own oxygen?”

“A fake one,” Rachel concurs. “But it’s the only direct flight I could get since you couldn’t take off work yesterday.” Rachel shoots Lou an apologetic look for the accusational tone.

“Aw, there’s the very chill and fun traveling companion I was promised,” Lou says.

Rachel crosses her arms and very consciously uncrosses them. “I’m trying.”

Lou cups her hand around Rachel’s shoulder and squeezes to comfort her. “You’re trying very hard.”

“Thank you,” Rachel says. “I’ll be much more chill and fun when we’re back in the air.”

“In two hours.”

“In two hours,” Rachel agrees. Lou catches her bottom lip in her teeth the way she always does when she’s trying not to say the obvious thing. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything. I merely considered setting a timer.”

“Yes, I saw it all in your face. I’m sorry this isn’t what you wanted.”

“Rach, we’re flying on a plane where armrests are considered a luxury item, bound for the wilds of rural Canada to attend your ex-fiancé’s wedding. More time with you being you is the _only_ thing I wanted.”

Rachel’s pout threatens to turn traitor, the corners of her mouth already curling up. “We don’t even have food.”

“I picked up something from PLG this morning when you were in the shower. You’re not the only one who can make a plan, Rachel Covington.”

The last vestiges of her frown are powerless against that. “Did you eat it all or is it hiding somewhere?”

Lou makes a satisfied hum as she wrestles her bag from under the seat and hands over a sandwich. It tastes like Sunday mornings and home.

“Thank you,” Rachel whispers.

“You’re welcome,” Lou whispers back.

The pilot change takes four hours instead of two. They’re going to be late to the wedding. Once they’re finally taxiing back to the runway, Rachel sends a text to Marcy to let Patrick know and a don’t-bother text to Alexis’s friend Twyla who was supposed to pick them up.

Then she puts her phone away and drops her head to her knees.

“You okay?” Lou asks, rubbing small circles across her back.

“I think I am, actually. As much as I wanted to be there, I think it would have been hard to watch this thing I wanted for so long happen to somebody else.”

“Yeah.” Then Lou is quiet, her palm swishing on Rachel’s jacket. Rachel can hear her brain working, too. Lou doesn’t usually have to voice her insecurities for Rachel to hear them.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about how things were ‘supposed’ to be. How I thought they were going to go the last time I showed up in Schitt’s Creek,” Rachel says, leaning back so she can look at Lou while she talks. “I don’t think I really want to get married anymore. At least not right now.”

Rachel can feel Lou relax next to her.

“It’s just... I think for most of my life, marriage was the big end goal. It felt like such a big thing, what everyone wanted for me. Imagine that! An end goal by thirty years old. Now, I don’t want to stop there. I want time to figure out what matters to me, what else I might want for myself.” Lou swallows, and Rachel realizes how that might sound. “I think I want to keep doing that with you. If you want.”

Lou’s hand stills on Rachel’s shoulder. “I’ve been thinking too. Do you remember I told you once not to get too invested in me?” Rachel nods. “I, um. I take it back. You can. If you want.”

Rachel beams, her smile surely brighter than anyone has previously smiled while in the care of Larry Air. “I want.”

Lou kisses Rachel and takes her hand, and the two of them stare at the bleak upholstery, smiling like idiots for the rest of the flight.

ALEXIS ARRANGED for someone named Gary to pick them up from the airport. He’s a DJ apparently, and still angling to be hired for the reception, which started thirty minutes ago.

Rachel lets him down kindly. “I assume they already have that covered.”

They arrive just in time for the cake cutting, taking their seats next to Alexis and across from her friends Twyla and Stevie.

Someone named Roland commandeers the microphone from Clint, introduces himself as the mayor, and begins to weave a convoluted tale about his buddies Dave and Patrick that sends Stevie into a fit of hysterical, silent laughter.

“I’ve been in New York a long time,” Lou whispers. “Is a speech by the mayor customary now in small-town Canada?”

“I don’t think so,” Rachel laughs.

Patrick feeds David a gigantic bite of cake, and then kisses the excess frosting off his mouth. It’s ridiculously cute. It doesn't really seem like something Patrick would do, except he looks so easy, so comfortable doing it. Which is beautiful, actually.

As they wait for the catering staff to distribute the rest of the cake, Alexis taps her on the shoulder and smiles the smile that was as much responsible for Rachel’s life now as her conversation with Patrick on the swings.

“So, here’s something fun. I’m actually moving to New York soon.”

Lou’s hand tightens on hers, and Rachel tries to convey some reassurance with a squeeze. “You should move to Brooklyn. We can show you around.” Alexis used to live in New York. She probably doesn’t need much of a tour. But Rachel likes the idea of it, showing someone around to all the places that feel specifically hers, specifically Home.

“Mmhmm, that’s very cute, but I will _not_ be moving to Brooklyn. But we should totally meet up downtown sometime and, like, get a drink or something.”

Rachel smiles. “I’d like that.”

Alexis looks over to her brother and then back at Rachel. This time, she’s serious. “It will be nice to know someone from here. I mean not from _here_ but—”

“From now,” Rachel says. She’s all too familiar with the difficulty of moving on surrounded only by people who know a past version of you.

Alexis nods tightly, but her smile is warm before she turns to her cake.

After the dancing starts, Rachel introduces Lou to Marcy and Clint and two of Patrick’s cousins who made the trip. Marcy gives her one of her patented hugs and then she gives Lou one too.

“You look so good, honey,” she says, and then wraps Rachel in another hug. While Rachel is being squeezed, Marcy whispers “Your mom would be so proud of you.”

“Thanks,” Rachel says. And after that she needs some air.

Stevie is also getting some air, and nursing a beer. “So, you’re a white wine drinker, huh?” Stevie asks.

“I... sure? As long as it’s not too sweet.”

Stevie grins oddly at that and then turns serious again. “So, when did you know?” she asks. Rachel isn’t sure exactly what she means, but she can guess. It’s a weird deja vu. She remembers asking Patrick the same thing.

“I don’t know. I thought it started with Alexis, actually.” Stevie looks up abruptly, and Rachel starts to put some pieces together. “But, really, it was when I stopped worrying about what I knew and started following what I felt.”

“Stevie! Stop hiding and come dance with me!” Alexis says, emerging from the back door of the town hall and slinging an arm around Stevie’s shoulder. Stevie shoots Rachel a _help me!_ look but it’s quickly replaced by a small smile.

“Have fun. Thanks for another successful girl talk!” Rachel calls after her.

She gets back to Lou just as Patrick and David start making the rounds.

“You must be Lou,” Patrick says after he and Rachel exchange hugs.

“I’m the girlfriend, yes. And you must be the husband,” she says to David.

David’s answering smile is wide and unfiltered and catching. “David, yes. The husband.” He and Patrick exchange the smallest of looks and it helps the remaining pool of jealousy in Rachel’s heart evaporate.

“Anyway, I was wondering if I could steal you for a dance,” Patrick says, holding out a hand to Rachel.

Lou smiles and waves her off, mouthing, “Go!”

So they dance. It feels so familiar in his arms, and yet somehow easier than it ever felt when they were together. They laugh and talk like they do in messages, on the phone, except this time, she can feel how little distance there is between them. Like, finally, the old wounds are no longer agitated by the process of trying to heal them.

“So, I heard Alexis and Stevie are running the store during your honeymoon,” Rachel says.

“Oh no, don’t remind me,” he laughs. “The last time we left our store in Alexis’s care she broke the sink with her boyfriend. At least we won’t have to worry about that this time.”

Over his shoulder, Rachel can see Alexis and Stevie ducking back outside, looking behind them to see if they’ve been caught. Alexis catches her eye and winks with both eyes. “You sure about that?”

“Yeah. Why? Do you know something?”

“Nope,” Rachel laughs. “Do your own sleuthing, Brewer.”

Patrick smiles. Takes a deep breath.

“It’s good. Having you here.”

“It’s going much better than last time,” Rachel jokes. “And hey, if you two are ever visiting Alexis...”

“I’ll call you,” he says.

When the song ends, Patrick takes another of those nervous breaths. “I, uh, actually have something for you.”

He disappears behind the stage and comes back with a small manila envelope.

“When they came up for my birthday, my mom brought a box of some things I left there. It had my old camera and a couple rolls of undeveloped film, which I mailed someplace to develop. They’re mostly from our graduation... I thought you might want a few of them.”

Rachel sits down at the nearest empty table and pulls the photos out. They broke up shortly after this, which is probably why he never had them developed. Rachel got a job in Toronto and Patrick decided to stay closer to home. Even that close to a breakup, the two of them look so sure of themselves.

“We were so young,” Rachel says, flipping through them. She gets to a picture of her sandwiched between her parents and hovers her fingertips over her mom. She can almost remember the feel of the soft fabric of her dress. The sight of her squeezes her heart.

“She would have been in the center of the dance floor all night if she were here,” Patrick says.

Rachel laughs. “Absolutely. She’d be teaching David the Charleston.”

“Or Lou!” Patrick says.

“She would have loved Lou. Maybe she’d get them both doing the electric slide.”

“I’m not sure even your mom could get David to do the electric slide.”

Rachel looks down again at the photo. “I never thought I would get another picture of her. Thank you for this.”

“You’re welcome,” Patrick says softly.

Rachel flips to the last photo, this one of just the two of them in their green caps and gowns. Patrick is kissing her cheek.

“Do you wish you could tell them what we know?” she asks.

Patrick shrugs and then looks around until he spots David where he’s still talking to Lou by the piano. “Sometimes. But only if I could know they’d still end up here.”

“Yeah,” Rachel says, watching David catch Patrick’s eye with a raised brow. He was beautiful before, but today he’s something else, the way he manages to careen from laughter to tears without looking whiplashed.

“Speaking of. I’m going to go dance with my husband.” He kisses her cheek and turns back just before he walks away. He swallows audibly. “Love ya, Rach.”

She blinks hard. “Love ya back.”

RACHEL BITES off a moan, her face pressed into the pillow, as Lou thrusts.

“Let it out, Rach,” Lou says with a laugh while she maintains the perfect angle, the perfect movement, perfect perfect perfect. “The people in Room Four certainly are.”

Rachel lets go and comes again, hard and crying out. Above her, Lou grins and kisses her with her mouth open, teeth sharpened by her heaving breaths, and keeps moving against Rachel until she’s spent. “There we go. Was that so hard?”

“Mmm,” Rachel hums.

Lou collapses next to her with a kiss to her shoulder while she slips out of the harness. They picked this one out together. So far, Lou hasn’t made a ton of money on Princess Marble, but she decided it was enough to ditch the toys that Rachel didn’t want to play with anymore. So they did. When the first box arrived in the mail, Rachel managed to restrain herself to only one joke about Princess Marble being the gift that keeps on giving.

Rachel loves wearing the harness they used tonight almost as much as she loves when Lou wears it. Now that the balance between things she likes and things Lou likes isn’t skewed by the overwhelming expectations she used to place on herself, it’s fun to explore all the ways they can fit together, please each other.

“Long day,” Lou whispers, pulling her close under the covers. It’s not a question. It actually feels like several days have passed since they landed at the Elm Glen Regional Airport, even though they’ve only been here a few hours.

“Yeah.” Rachel curls against her with the intention of drifting off to sleep. They have to get up early tomorrow to go through the whole Larry Air ordeal again. But the walls of this place hold memories that won’t let her rest.

“You know how in different languages they have more than one word for love? Like in Ancient Greek there’s _philia_ for friendship love and _agape_ for unconditional love and _eros_ for erotic love. Others too, I think.”

“Okay,” Lou says, rubbing her eyes to keep them open. “Is this something they teach you in landscape architecture school?”

“No. Sunday School.”

“What kind of Sunday School is teaching about _eros_?” Lou’s interest is suddenly piqued.

“That’s not the point,” Rachel laughs.

Lou rubs her thumb along Rachel’s bottom lip, tracing her smile.

“The point is, there should be a word for queer love. It’s just... I don’t know. Different.”

“Okay,” Lou whispers. “It’s okay to just call it love. We fought hard for that.”

“I know.”

Rachel ponders, pleating the edge of the sheet between her fingers where it’s draped over Lou’s hip. She has tried on a few different labels. For now, she likes queer, but not for lack of a better word. It feels roomy, kind of like New York, with lots of space still to grow into herself. She’s spent her whole life limited by definitions that didn’t fit. It feels good to let herself exist in something wider, less easily-defined.

Rachel sighs and buries her face in Lou’s side. She can’t quite explain what it feels like to say _I love you_ and know there’s the same kind of power flowing through the I and the you. “For me, it’s still different. It doesn’t feel like enough, to just call it love. It feels like some secret power that I’ve finally learned how to use.”

Lou wraps a lock of Rachel’s hair around her finger and draws it back over her shoulder, almost like she did in their first kiss. “I can see that. But... Rach. If that’s true, I don’t think it’s a secret anymore.”

Rachel thinks about sitting with Lou in Peppa’s Jerk Chicken on her first day in Brooklyn, about telling her a secret and making it real for herself. She thinks about kissing her outside the Cyclone right in the middle of the crowd on the Coney Island boardwalk. She thinks about dancing with Lou tonight, at her best friend’s wedding. And later, in their bed, about the way Lou said _Let it out, Rach_ and the way she came, happy and uncomplicated and free.

“You’re right,” Rachel says. And then she smiles. “It’s not.”

Alt Text: Rachel and Lou kissing on the Brooklyn Bridge.

**Author's Note:**

> Lou's game Princess Marble is inspired by the song [Yellow Flicker Beat](https://youtu.be/3PdILZ_1P74) written by Lorde and Joel Little.
> 
> Art by me.
> 
> Thanks to another_Hero and Earlylight for organizing the Elevate Femslash Exchange and to yourbuttervoicedbeau for the great prompt.
> 
> To swat117, thanks are not enough for the literal pages of info about Brooklyn and subsequent help turning it into a story. To this_is_not_nothing, thanks for a clutch response to a last-minute question that saved me from scouring the internet. To olive2read, so many thanks for checking in, encouragement, and being a most helpful beta as I pushed it down to the wire. And to Likerealpeopledo, thanks for alpha-reading late night snippets, brainstorming, and beta-reading multiple versions of everything, and most importantly thanks for being the world’s best emotional support chicken during a panicked rush to finish this in time for the fest.
> 
> And finally, thanks for reading!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [As it was made to be](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28940334) by [DesignatedGrape](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesignatedGrape/pseuds/DesignatedGrape)




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